I have had the good fortune to have had in my life many people whom I consider to be teachers.  I do not refer only to individuals whose job it was to instruct students in a classroom, though some of these people were professional teachers of subjects as well.  Rather, these men and women taught principles, ideals, and the means to "right living."  Often they had acquired this wisdom through the experience of considerable suffering, emerging from these experiences into a mental state of considerable joy and serenity.  They felt compelled to pass on what they had learned, and these are some of the ideas that they conveyed to me.

> The greatest freedom that one can have is freedom from the bondage of self.  While no one can be, or was meant to be, utterly selfless, we are happier when we focus more on the needs of others than on our own.  When we sink deeply into our own heads, we are behind enemy lines; we can be our own worst enemies.  Dwelling exclusively on our own needs and desires may serve only to make us discontent; focusing on others makes us, paradoxically, more comfortable in our own skins.  Very often, doing good for others makes us feel good about ourselves.

> Cultivate empathy, the ability to feel as others do, to understand why they think and act as they do, to – in the popular metaphor – walk a mile in the other person's shoes.  This principle, which echoes the words of St. Francis that one should strive more "to understand than to be understood," is a direct result of the goal stated above – freedom from the bondage of self.  Sympathy, the feeling of sorrow at another's difficulties is an admirable but shallow trait; empathy is much deeper. To be sympathetic is to observe others as they struggle with the storms of life, perhaps feeling a twinge of regret that they are so beset, while we remain safe in our own emotional shelters.  To be empathetic is to have the courage to venture into the storm ourselves and guide them to shelter.

> Accept life on its own terms.  Life is difficult, and it is unreasonable of us to expect it to be easy – for ourselves or for others.  Bad things happen to good people.  We may perhaps turn bad into good, or we may, by being more careful and thoughtful, prevent bad things from happening.  However, we have no control over what has already happened.  If we are to navigate, with some equilibrium, the sometimes tempestuous waters of life, we must endeavor (in the words of the serenity prayer) to have the serenity to accept what we cannot change and the courage to change what we can.  How we acquire "the wisdom to know the difference" is something of a puzzle, but the least we can do is to accept that we have little control over the future and none whatever over the past.

> Therefore, we must live in today, taking one day at a time or, if we must, one minute or hour at a time.  This concept is so commonplace that it has become a cliché, yet it is one of the most difficult to practice.  We naturally regret past misdeeds and misfortunes, and we naturally want to plan for (and perhaps control) the future.  Nonetheless, if we spend a large portion of the present moment dwelling on the past or trying to control future outcomes, we shall miss much of the joy that is to be had in the present.  Before we know it, life will have passed us by, and we shall be left with little but regrets over opportunities not taken, dreams unfulfilled, and joys denied.

> Recognize, in adversity, that this too shall pass.  When life comes crashing down around our ears, it is natural to think that our problems will last forever.  Some people I know keep a "God box"; when something bothers them, they write it on a piece of paper and put it in the God box.  These individuals tell me that the practice helps to relieve stress, and they also say that, when they go back after a period of time and read what was troubling them a month or a week ago, they sometimes laugh at themselves:  "Was I really worried about that?"  Tough situations have a way of working themselves out if we wait long enough and calmly enough.  This doesn't mean that we should ignore problems and not seek solutions, thinking that they will disappear by themselves.  Balance and judgment are required.  We need the wisdom to recognize what we cannot fix and the courage to deal with the things we must.  But it does us no good to obsess about temporary setbacks as if they will last forever.

> Don't sweat the small stuff.  Somebody has appended "and it's all small stuff" to this axiom, but I don't think that's true.  Life throws a lot of punches, and some of these come very close to being knockout blows.  Still, it's a curious fact of human nature that many of us handle major crises with poise and even bravery, while small aggravations turn us into raving maniacs.  Well-balanced people don't go over the edge when the computer crashes, the car won't start, or Johnny has a nosebleed.  They calmly do what needs to be done and move on.

> By now, the reader is probably feeling that he or she falls short in several or all of these categories:  other people can do these things, but I can't.  That leads to another axiom – don't compare your insides to other people's outsides.  We all have the experience of seeing someone who appears to "have it all together," while we feel that we do not.  We don't recognize that they may feel the same way about us.  All of us have a fairly good idea of what's going on within ourselves emotionally, but we don't always show it.  Thus, other people may think we're "all together" when we're not, and the same is true of our perception of them.  We may, for example, envy the public speaker who appears perfectly poised before a large group, when, in reality, that person is a bundle of nerves but has learned how to hide the fact.  When we compare our insides to others' outsides – unless the others are beset with great misfortune – we usually come up wanting.  It's a certain path to an inferiority complex.

One's natural response to all these words of wisdom is "easier said than done."  That's my reaction, too.  Nobody can follow these ideals all the time, perhaps not even most of the time.  They are, after all, ideals.  However, we can still look toward them as beacons to guide us.  We will be happier and more serene for having done so.