We have a side to our character that we are generally unaware of—our social personality, the different person we become when we operate in groups of … - Robert Greene

Let us call this quality the Original Mind. This mind looked at the world more directly — not through words and received ideas. It was flexible and receptive to new information. Retaining a memory of this Original Mind, we cannot help but feel nostalgia for the intensity with which we used to experience the world. As the years pass, this intensity inevitably diminishes. We come to see the world through a screen of words and opinions; our prior experiences, layered over the present, color what we see. We no longer look at things as they are, noticing their details, or wonder why they exist. Our minds gradually tighten up. We become defensive about the world we now take for granted, and we become upset if our beliefs or assumptions are attacked.

Understand: your mind is weaker than your emotions. But you become aware of this weakness only in moments of adversity,precisely the time when
you need strength. What best equips you to cope with tthe heat of battle is neither more knowledge nor more intellect. What makes your mind stronger, and more able to control your emotions, is internal discipline and toughness.No one can teach you this skill; you cannot learn it by reading about it. Like any discipline, it can come only through practice, experience, even a little suffering. The first step in building up presence of mind is to see the need for it, to want it badly enough to be willing to work for it.

Your fears are a kind of prison that confines you within a limited range of action. The less you fear, the more power you will have and the more fully you will live.