Way of the Peaceful Warrior Read Online Free PDF Page B

how much more ridicule I could take.  
    The weeks passed quickly, and my sleepless nights became commonplace. Somehow, I adjusted. And there was another change: I found that my visits with Socrates were becoming even more interesting to me than gymnastics practice.  
    Each night while we serviced cars--he put the gas in, I did windows, and both of us joked with customers--he would encourage me to talk about my life. He was strangely silent about his own, meeting my questions with a terse, “Later,” or answering in complete non-sequitirs.  
    When I asked him why he was so interested in the details of my life, he said, “I need to understand your personal illusions to grasp the scope of your illness. We are going to have to clean your mind before the door to the warrior's way can open.”  
    “Don't you touch my mind. I like it just the way it is.”  
    “If you really liked it the way it is, you wouldn't be here now. You've changed your mind many times in the past. Soon, you're going to do it in a more profound way.” After that, I decided I was going to have to be very careful with this man. I didn't know him all that well, and I still wasn't sure how crazy he was.  
    As it was, Soc's style was constantly changing, unorthodox, humorous, and even bizarre. Once he ran screaming after a little white dog that had just peed on the station steps---right in the middle of a lecture he was giving me on the “supreme benefits of an unshakably serene composure.”  
    Another time, about a week later, after we'd stayed up all night, we walked to Strawberry Creek and stood on a bridge, looking down at the stream overflowing with the winter rains.  
    “I wonder how deep the stream is today?” I casually remarked, gazing absent-mindedly down into the rushing waters. The next thing I knew, I'd splashed into the churning, muddy brown water. He had tossed me off the bridge!  
    “Well, how deep is it?”  
    “Deep enough,” I sputtered, dragging myself and my waterlogged clothes to shore. So much for idle speculation. I made a mental note to keep my mouth shut.  
    As the days passed I started to notice more and more differences between us. In the office, I'd devour candy bars when I got hungry; Soc munched on a fresh apple or pear or made himself herb tea. I fidgeted around on the couch while he sat serenely still on his chair, like a Buddha. My movements were awkward and noisy compared to the way he softly glided across the floor. And he was an old man, mind you.  
    There were many small lessons that awaited me each night, even in the early days. One night I made the mistake of complaining about how people at school just didn't seem to act very friendly toward me.  
    Softly, he said, “It is better for you to take responsibility for your life as it is, instead of blaming others, or circumstances, for your predicament. As your eyes open, you'll see that your state of health, happiness, and every circumstance of your life has been, in large part, arranged by you--consciously or unconsciously.”  
    “I don't know what you mean, but I don't think I agree with it.” “Well, here's a story about a guy like you, Dan:  
     
    On a construction site in the Midwest, when the lunch whistle blew, all the workers would sit down together to eat. And with singular regularity Sam would open his lunch pail and start to complain.  
    “Son of a gun!” he'd cry, “not peanut butter and jelly sandwiches again. I hate peanut butter and jelly!”  
    Sam moaned about his peanut butter and jelly sandwiches day after day after day. Weeks passed, and the other workers were getting irritated by his behavior. Finally, another man on the work crew said, “Fer crissakes, Sam, if you hate peanut butter and jelly so much, why don't you just tell yer o' lady to make you something different?”  
    “What do you mean, my o' lady?” Sam replied. “I'm not married. I make my own sandwiches.”  
     
    Socrates paused, then added, “So you