Feb 14-17 Verse 13

Favor and disgrace seem alarming.

High status greatly afflicts your person.

Why are favor and disgrace alarming?

Seeking favor is degrading:

Alarming when it is gotten,

Alarming when it is lost.

Why does high status greatly afflict your person?

The reason we have a lot of trouble

Is that we have selves.

If we had no selves,

What trouble would we have?

Man’s true self is eternal,

Yet he thinks. I am this body and will soon die.

If we have no body, what calamities can we have?

One who sees himself as everything

Is fit to be guardian of the world.

One who loves himself as everyone

Is fit to be teacher of the world,

Ask yourself right now, What's my own nature if I have no outside forces telling me who or what I should be?  Then work at living one day in complete harmony with your own nature, ignoring pressures to be otherwise.  If your inner nature is one of peace, love, and harmony as a musical genius, for instance, then act on just that today.