Q: Why is criticism so popular?
A: Because it requires no intelligence.

Q: What is meant by instant recovery?
A: It’s a skill for returning to yourself instantly after getting kidnapped by a harmful feeling.

Q: We feel encouraged when you assure us we can make it.
A: Do you know what — it’s far more than an encouragement — it’s a beautiful fact.

Q: I don’t know how to change myself.
A: What’s that got to do with it? Keep going.

Q: You said I can change the entire world. How?
A: Change your reactions to the world and the whole world changes for you.

Q: Why can’t I get help from friends?
A: Why can’t a carrot get help from rabbits?

Q: Give us a liberating message.
A: You need never pretend to be unafraid.

Q: What must I understand about heartache?
A: It’s a condition but not a necessity.

Q: How can I see myself as I really am?
A: Ask whether other people might see you different from the way you see yourself.

Q: I feel tied down by invisible ropes.
A: The ropes are your own wrong thoughts which higher insight can break.

Q: Give us the first step for ending suffering.
A: Stop denying that you suffer from being you.

Q: It’s hard to even ask intelligent questions.
A: I’m just waiting for someone to ask if they’ll be tap dancing in heaven.

Q: Please summarize these teachings.
A: You suffer from being who you now are. We will show you how to end suffering by becoming someone else.

Q: I want to find this new world you speak about.
A: Then don’t be like a duck who thinks that his private pond is a great ocean.

Q: Why do riches and fame fail to satisfy?
A: Because a decorated dungeon is still a dungeon.

Q: Are my thoughts eternal?
A: No, but you are.

Q: Tell us one of the wonders we will see.
A: While still in this life you can discover what is beyond this life.

Q: I don’t understand what it means to be receptive.
A: It means to suspend your pride so that your deep confusion can be explained to you.

Q: How does knowledge of the mind conquer pain?
A: By seeing that thoughts must be allowed to come and go naturally, you give pain no den in which to breed itself.”

Q: Give us an example of how we misunderstand life.
A: Anything that forces you to examine your present beliefs is a friend.

Q: What makes me feel in danger?
A: Trying to force life to conform to your personal notions of safety.

Q: Help us get rid of self-defeating ways.
A: See that your habits and impulses have been acquired, for that supplies power for dismissal.

Q: How can I tell whether or not I have a false position?
A: You have a false position if the opposite position makes you nervous.

Q: Tormenting thoughts scream for my attention.
A: We’ll teach you how to refuse to talk with them.

Q: What is profitable seeking?
A: Seeking without a cunning wish to find yourself in everything you find.

Q: How does awareness bring relief?
A: When you’re aware of playing a role you no longer play it, which ends self-division.

Q: How can I replace false confidence with real confidence?
A: You may wish to write down the following: cosmic confidence is constant confidence.

Q: Why can’t I hear the rescuing voice?
A: The voice is calling down into the cave but you must climb up within hearing.

Q: How can we tell the difference between fact and fantasy?
A: By not having an ego-investment in fantasy.

Q: What happens when I give up pretense?
A: Release and relief.

Q: When will I be right?
A: When you need no other person to confirm your rightness.

Q: I think I’m nice but others don’t.
A: I wonder who’s right?

Q: I like to have fun.
A: First take life as a school, not as a theater, after which you can have all the fun you want.

Q: Give us a helpful truth that our vanity doesn’t want to hear.
A: You’re doing the wrong things to solve your problems.

Q: Please explain hostility.
A: Hostility exists in the space between what you imagine you are owed and what you actually get.

Q: I live for thrills but you say this is foolish.
A: If you’re caught in a storm it’s senseless to stop and get excited over all your money.

Q: I lust after every pretty girl I see.
A: Lust is loss of self-command. You can see her without losing yourself to her.

Q: I need inner refreshment.
A: Truth-drops are as refreshing to the spirit as raindrops are refreshing to the earth.

Q: Tell me how to get more.
A: Give up more.

Q: What does it mean to think from my cosmic mind?
A: To NOT think from your conditioned mind.

Q: Give me a thought to take back to my local study group?
A: Be aware of what you are doing at the moment you are doing it.

Q: What do you know about me that I don’t?
A: That along with the rest of humanity you’re under a strange hypnotic spell and don’t see that you are.

Q: What do you mean when saying we have a false feeling of life?
A: Living from emotions such as anger or envy which produce a destructive thrill.

Q: You said a feeling of futility can be used wisely. How?
A: See the futility of solving problems with usual thinking, which is an upward step toward cosmic wisdom.

Q: Help me stop the mad pace of my life.
A: See how hard you work to make life hard.

Q: Why must we depart from our present beliefs?
A: Because you can’t reach the mountaintop by staying in the valley.

Q: It’s hard to even ask intelligent questions.
A: I’m just waiting for someone to ask if they’ll be tap dancing in heaven.

Q: What is an example of social slavery?
A: Giving your attention to a demanding person when you really don’t want to give it.

Q: Does a conscious man have eternal life?
A: A conscious man is eternal life.

Q: Help me to understand my artificial behavior.
A: You try to make other people feel liked by you so that you will feel liked by them.

Q: I try to be myself but fail.
A: Stop trying to be yourself and you'll be yourself.

Q: In simple language, what must I do to change everything?
A: Let higher understanding break through the wall of habitual thoughts.

Q: I have a strange loyalty to hardened ideas.
A: How odd to be loyal to self-injury.

Q: How can I have the power of awareness?
A: Once you see the difference between thinking and awareness you can stop thought and be aware.

Q: What is suffering?
A: A message that something needs correction, which a wise person heeds.

Q: Is everyone as dumb as I am?
A: It depends on how dumb you are.

Q: I want a first glimpse of the higher kingdom.
A: Seeing that you must depart from usual thoughts is the same as sighting the kingdom.

Q: What do you mean by cosmic power?
A: The true power residing above all human deception.

Q: What is the new world?
A: Your new mind.

Q: I feel accused and condemned.
A: Only by your present misunderstanding of yourself.

Q: I like the idea of getting out of my own haunted house.
A: And when you succeed you’ll wonder why you waited so long.

Q: We feel encouraged when you assure us we can make it.
A: Do you know what — it’s far more than encouragement — it’s a beautiful fact.

Q: Why does delusion fail to satisfy?
A: Because nothing can’t be felt as something.

Q: Maybe I don’t know what I’m talking about after all.
A: That’s a positive doubt that can teach you to know what you’re talking about.

Q: I’ve been a phony all my life.
A: Isn’t it a relief to see it? Now you can become real.

Q: How can I end spiritual laziness?
A: Always do exactly what laziness doesn’t want you to do; for example, think about these ideas when you don’t feel like it.

Q: Why do I go to my relatives for dinner when I don’t even like them?
A: Probably for the dinner.

Q: You advise us to be spiritual detectives. What should we detect?
A: Detect the fact that everything that makes you unhappy has false power over you.

Q: Everyone is afraid. Please give us a fact about fear to memorize.
A: Fear is an unnecessary agitation that supplies a harmful distraction from what must be faced.

Q: What is a first course in the cosmic college?
A: Never fear that these lessons may be too much for you — the entire universe is your patient teacher.

Q: I want something else but don’t know what it is.
A: Don’t let your usual thinking tell you what it is and you will finally know what it is.

Q: Life demands answers, but I don’t know what to say.
A: It’s marvelous freedom to have nothing to say.

Q: Maybe I have wrong ideas about goodness.
A: Wrong ideas about goodness make you the victim of charlatans who’ll hurt you.

Q: I like the idea of calling the bluff on my troubles. How is it done?
A: Invite troubles to do their worst to you. This gets them so confused they lose interest in you.

Q: I’m astonished that I neglected these truths so long.
A: But now your personal miracle has begun.

Q: What is a first course in the Cosmic College?
A: Never fear that these lessons may be too much for you — the entire universe is your patient teacher.

Q: What is disturbance?
A: Disturbance is the interruption of your daydream by fact.

Q: I want to learn but what if I make dumb mistakes?
A: I give you permission to make ten-thousand mistakes.

Q: What am I?
A: You are what you actually value, not what you say you value?

Q: Why don’t I understand these teachings?
A: Because you can’t see above your own level. But cheer up — you’re raising your level.

Q: How will these ideas change our day?
A: The day will belong to you instead of to your anxiety.

Q: I feel like a soldier on a dangerous battlefield.
A: One day you will tell yourself the war is over.

Q: Is blabbermouthery connected with unhappiness?
A: Blabbermouthery is an attempt to convince oneself, but only succeeds in self-torment.

Q: Can my willingness open the door?
A: If you’re willing to be mistaken.

Q: What good things come from these teachings?
A: So many good things you won’t be able to count them.

Q: I’m guilty of foolish thoughts.
A: You can learn wise thoughts which will chase them out.

Q: How can I detect vanity?
A: Notice the pet flatteries you run through your mind, such as what a lovable little sugar-pie you are.