It is better not to mind what anyone says. Do you understand Me? It is a waste of your energy. No matter what someone says, he is talking about himself. You see this with others more easily than you see this with yourself, yet it is so. What you frown at is you, beloveds. No matter how wrong what someone said may be, you are the one looking at it, and you are prolonging it when it's better to drop it.
You would never murder, and yet you would sentence someone who has murdered to death. The accuser and the accused are the same just as the seeker and the sought are the same. Do not even accuse one who accuses you. Go to a party or look up at the stars instead.
Every person who speaks is identifying himself. Every person who takes another's words to heart is partnering with the consciousness of the other. When you are a rich man, and a poor man says you are poor, what do you care?
When I say everyone is equal, I do not mean to imply that you are to keep your attention or consciousness equally where someone else's may be. Nor do I imply that you are to right every wrong.
This is another reason why I ask you to never complain. What you complain about is where your attention is holding court, even if for a moment. If you do not like a song that is playing, change the station. Find a tune you like. Complaints are not uplifting. They may not even be edifying. If you are the one complaining, your complaints certainly do not edify you. Remove yourself from the complaint department.
There are many good causes in the world. If your cause is to save wildlife, love the wildlife and do not put your attention on those who do not have your awareness. You will do more for wild animals by loving those who persecute them than you will by frightening the hunters. You will do more for lady slippers by loving them than you will by remonstrating against those who wittingly or unwittingly pick them or trample on them.
Do not accept that those who speak unlovingly to you are correct. Nor do you use your mind and heart to protest that the speakers are incorrect. Throw out all those times when your mind and emotions put you on trial and you thought you had to speculate on your case or win it in the court of your mind.
Nor is it the best use of your energy to take praise given to you to heart. True or not true, you are better off without drinking it down. Enjoy it, and let it roll off your back. Think well of yourself to begin with, and you will not need applause, and you will not relish it so much, nor will you miss it.
Do not mind so much what people say, and do not mind so much what people think. Mind what you say and what you think. This one thing will change the course of your life and the course of others' lives as well.
When you do not like something, attend to yourself. At the very least, slough off your thoughts about that which you do not like. Putting your attention on what you don't like is like driving in reverse. That's all it is. Everyone knows it's harder to drive in reverse than it is to drive in forward gear.
Beloveds, do not think that I am chastising you. I am pointing to a new direction for you now. Let go of the past. It is from the past that complaints grow. And if it is the present moment that you do not like, then bend toward the new moment arising now and find that within it which you do like.