Empathy

We're taught when we're young that the opposite of love is hate. But it's not. Hate is a byproduct. The opposite of love is fear. Fear is what blinds us. Fear is corrosive. Fear makes us hold back.

Optimism is often dismissed as false hope. But there is also false hopelessness. That's the attitude that says we can't defeat poverty and disease. We absolutely can.

So let your heart break. It will change what you do with your optimism.

If our optimism doesn't address the problems that affect so many of our fellow human beings, then our optimism needs more empathy. If empathy channels our optimism, we will see the poverty and the disease and the poor schools — and we will surprise the pessimists.

That incomparable feeling is what happens when you do the right thing.

Ideally, we lose ourselves in what we read only to return to ourselves transformed, and part of a more expansive world.

The first steps toward non-violence, which is surely an absolute obligation we all bear, is to begin to think carefully and to ask others to do the same.

It betrays a poverty of ambition if all you think about is what goods you can buy instead of what good you can do.

Whatever success I have achieved, whatever positions of leadership I have held have depended less on Ivy League degrees or SAT scores or GPAs, and have instead been due to that sense of connection and empathy.

Though there is much of life that you must face alone, you cannot make it out here in this world by yourself. Don't leave your support system when you are in distress.

What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness. Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded... sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly.

Your life is going to be a gradual process of becoming kinder and more loving. Hurry up. Speed it along. Start right now.