War and Peace Inside Ourselves:
“Undisturbed calmness of mind is attained by cultivating friendliness toward the happy, compassion for the unhappy, delight in the virtuous, and indifference toward the wicked.” Patanjali
To me, the power of this statement comes from how it reflects a common thread of internal equanimity running through reactions to both the virtuous and wicked, the happy and unhappy. This calmness of mind is an entry to the realization that:
“The biggest embrace of love you'll ever make is to embrace yourself completely. And you'll realize you've just embraced the whole universe, and everything and everybody in it.” Adyashanti
The whole universe. Everything. Everybody. That’s really hard to embrace, eh? Whether it’s inside or outside, we’ve all got those things that we just will not embrace.
When we see things that horrify or offend us, the most comfortable internal road to take is to distance ourselves with blame and a desire to eliminate and/or punish. It seems completely counterintuitive to allow the gentle realization of understanding to dawn on us. It can feel like we are condoning or empowering the wrong, if we admit that somewhere inside we know delusion and desperation, we know how lost in a train of thought we can become, we know how vicious and out of control anger can become….And yet, peace within only comes from such gentle understanding, such calmness, and such a willingness to embrace it all.
#peaceday #september21
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