A true education of the mind consists of five principal phases that prepare a person for a higher life. These phases are:
1. Developing the power of concentration and the capacity for attention.
2. Developing the capacities of expansion, wideness, complexity, and richness.
3. Organizing ideas around a central or higher ideal or a supremely luminous idea that serves as a guide in life.
4. Exercising thought control and rejecting undesirable thoughts.
5. Developing mental silence, perfect calm, and total receptivity to inspirations from the higher regions of the being.