You seek peace in the world, outside of you.
In various places, situations, circumstances and perhaps even in people.
Your peace can only exist within yourself, not outside.
Your ability to recognise this truth and then finding peace within yourself is the one true secret to happiness in life.
Whatever the outside situation may be, you can find peace within yourself even in the midst of a storm.
Your peace lives inside you and not with another person. Not tied to a specific place and certainly not in shiny new objects (phones, jewellery, cars, houses etc).
Some places, people, objects and even materials (drugs, alcohol) can have the effect of bringing you ‘peace’. This is not peace. It is a transitory emotion. It is not manifested from within but exists due to a catalyst. It will fade away as soon as that person, material, objects, place fades away. It is not lasting but fleeting.
On the other hand, we blame certain people and places for disturbing our peace. None can disturb your peace but you. The beauty of creating your own peace – No one can take it away from you.
When you can live at peace with yourself you also develop the ability to live at peace with others, no matter who they are and what they do.
So how do you go about creating this peace of yours?
“The soul that moves in the world of the senses and yet keeps the senses in harmony, free from attraction and aversion, finds rest in quietness. In this quietness falls down the burden of all her sorrows, for when the heart has found quietness, wisdom has also found peace.” — The Bhagavad Gita
According to this timeless text, peace comes from finding your quietness. From finding your equanimity between attraction and aversion.
Here are a few other ways to find your peace:
- Focus your attention on things you can control
- Spend time in nature
- Accept yourself as who you are
- Be true to yourself (Stop pretending and conforming to believes that are not yours)
- Meditate
- Slow Down
- Learn to accept and let go
- Avoid trying to change others
- Avoid trying to change things that you cannot control
Practice these things in your daily life and you will feel the transformation.
Learn to be at peace with yourself in whatever situation you are, you will automatically be at peace with everything else. It is ourselves that we resist the most hence it is ourselves we need to accept first.
“The life of inner peace, being harmonious and without stress, is the easiest type of existence.” —Norman Vincent Peale