WAY OF THE PEACEFUL WARRIOR: A Book That Changes Lives

by Dan Millman

“To rid yourself of old patterns, focus all your energy not on struggling with the old, but on building the new.” “How can I control my habits if I can’t even seem to control my emotions?” “You don’t need to control emotion,” he said. “Emotions are natural, like passing weather. Sometimes it’s fear, sometimes sorrow or anger. Emotions are not the problem. The key is to transform the energy of emotion into constructive action.” I got up, took the whistling kettle off the hot plate, and poured the steaming water into our mugs. “Can you give me a specific example, Socrates?” “Spend time with a baby.” Smiling, I blew on my tea. “Funny, I never thought of babies as masters of emotions.” “When a baby is upset, it expresses itself in banshee wails — pure crying. It doesn’t wonder about whether it should be crying. Babies accept their emotions completely. They let feelings flow, then let them go. In this way, infants are fine teachers. Learn their lessons and you’ll dissolve old habits.”