The Art of Happiness

very sensitive and respectful to the concretereality of your situation as you proceed on thepath towards your ultimate goal. Recognize thedifficulties inherent in your path, and the fact thatit may take time and a consistent effort. It’simportant to make a clear distinction in your mindbetween your ideals and the standards by whichyou judge your progress. As a Buddhist, forinstance, you set your ideals very high: fullEnlightenment is your ultimate expectation.Holding full Enlightenment as your ideal ofachievement is not an extreme. But expecting toachieve it quickly, here and now, becomes anextreme. Using that as a standard instead ofyour ideal causes you to become discouragedand completely lose hope when you don’tquickly achieve Enlightenment. So you need arealistic approach. On the other hand, if you say,