overcomes his distress
« Before your eyes can see God, they must have become incapable of shedding tears over your own sufferings. Your voice cannot express eternal wisdom until it has lost all power to hurt. So kill in you any ambition to excel in the poor paths of reputation. Stop considering your life as your most precious asset.
"I lose weight and I turn pale. I wandered around aimlessly, in the grip of an immense distaste for the distractions and interests of the world. I was sad because of the sorrows I saw around me. I longed for the higher plane whose reality I finally knew and where my loved ones were. But I couldn't rise up to them and they didn't come to me. So I studied the rules of the Path. Then I received the shock in return of the effect of my behavior on the charming woman who loved me. Was I doing to him what I would have liked to be done to me? No. So I made firm resolutions, tamed my own sorrows, made my animal nature a tool in the service of my soul, and stopped letting it take over me.
So I started to smile again, the colors came back to me and my wife became happy again. As for me, I had finally discovered the true Path, that of Service. I no longer wept over myself, my tongue no longer hurt anyone with morose phrases, and, supreme triumph, my feet were bathed in the living blood of animal nature. I lived without selfishness, my whole being strained to act for the best, as happy as if I were exclusively seeking happiness, as serious as if I were guided by ambition. It was then that the peace of silence settled in me." »