Just as poison, upon entering the bloodstream, spreads throughout the body, so also a fault, when it can find an opening, spreads throughout the mind.
Just as one instantly leaps up when a snake is put on one’s lap, so one should immediately take counteraction at the approach of sleep and laziness.
Recognizing that one is full of faults but others are oceans of virtue, one should aspire to abandon the self-sense and give oneself to others.
The passions and shattered hopes spring from desiring the impossible. He who is free from hope has everywhere never-ending good fortune.
—Shantideva’s “Entering the Path to Enlightenment”