The unenlightened mind sees in the shadows of existence only misfortune where the enlightened mind sees Karmic instruction and opportunity for self-improvement along with misfortune. When it is schooled both by experience and revelation to recognize and admit that its own mistaken behaviour has led to most of its misfortunes, to see the causal connection between personal wrong-doing and the penal troubles or sufferings which follow in its wake, it will act righteously through fear. But later, when it is schooled by subtler experience and loftier revelation to see the divine quest which life ordains it to follow, it will act righteously not from fear but through faith. When it comes to see or believe that most of its griefs are self-inflicted, it sees well.
-- Notebooks Category 13: Human Experience > Chapter 1 : Situation > # 195
