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he may not be able to follow that advice himself.
You can watch it. Everybody is a good adviser to others; when it comes to his own life he is as much a fool as anybody else. Much can be learned by observing, by listening, by seeing, even from those who are ignorant -- because you are also ignorant -- even from those who are dull -- because you are also not very intelligent. And this will be the beginning of intelligence, the beginning of wisdom.
The intelligent person is one who learns from every opportunity, who never misses a single opportunity to learn something, who makes his whole life a school, a learning, a discipline, a search, an enquiry.
But remember not to compromise, not to surrender. As far as the essential is concerned, beware. Even if you have to risk your life, risk it, but don't surrender as far as the essential is concerned. And as far as the non-essential is concerned, don't even waste a single moment on it -- agree.
This was one of the agreements between me and my father. When I was a very small child I told him, "Listen, I will agree to every non-essential thing. You can tell me what clothes to wear, what shoes to wear; what to eat, what not to eat, you can tell me. But as far as any essential is concerned, beware -- I am not going to agree to it."
And slowly he watched and he was convinced, because whenever it was a non-essential thing I was always ready to agree with him. He would say, "Go to this college, not to that," so, "Okay, because to me each college is like any other college -- they are all stupid so it doesn't matter. I will go to this college." "Study this subject." "Okay, because what does it matter? -- economics or politics or history or geography or philosophy or psychology, anything will do.
But as far as any essential is concerned I told him, "This is an essential point, I will not agree with you, so you better not say anything about it because that will be an unnecessary misery for you."
When, I came back from the university it was a natural thing to ask whether I wanted to get married or not. I to1d him, "This is an essential," and that was the last time he enquired about it;
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