A basic skill in developing wisdom and personal integrity, not to mention peace of mind, is speaking and listening skillfully, often remaining quiet, and limiting the topics we discuss.
Conversation about kings, robbers, & ministers of state; armies, alarms, & battles; food & drink; clothing, furniture, garlands, & scents; relatives; vehicles; villages, towns, cities, the countryside; women & heroes; the gossip of the street & the well; tales of the dead; tales of diversity, the creation of the world & of the sea;talk of whether things exist or not
Talk on modesty,on contentment, on seclusion, on non-entanglement, on arousing persistence, on virtue, on concentration, on discernment, on release, and on the knowledge & vision of release.
