When there is misunderstanding I become angry, I weep, I laugh, I feel pity. But instead of this, is it not my duty to keep calm and try to remove the misunderstanding.

What shall we believe? Praise of us or censure of us? Both may be undeserved. Then, shall we be our own judges? Here too there is room enough for error. God alone knows what we are, but He does not tell us. It is, therefore, best neither to seek to know nor believe anything about ourselves. We are what we are. Nothing is to be gained by knowing or believing what we are. Performance of duty is the only thing that really matters.

Blind is not he who has lost his eyes, but he who hides his shortcomings.

Mans serenity of mind can be tested only in the world of men, not on the solitary heights of the Himalayas.

An ideal is one thing; living up to it is quite another.

A man without an ideal is like a ship without a rudder.

I may be said to have an ideal only when I put forth an effort to realize it. (Written on 15-4-1945.)

We may rest content with trying, provided we make the right effort and to the best of our ability. The result does not depend on the effort alone. There are other factors over which we have no control.

What shall be called the right effort? One test is that very often it yields the desired result. So the rightness is judged by the result. But experience shows that this is not always the case. Right effort is that in which there is deep conviction about the correctness of the means employed, so much so that, even in the face of contrary results, the means do not change, nor does the effort vary or slacken.

What shall be called the best of our ability? That effort in which we spend all our energy without stint. Success generally attends such pure effort.