Peace

What is peace? Is it saving the world or stopping a war?? No it starts with you. To be at peace is a very hard thing to do. Yesterday I talked of forgiveness, the next step is peace. Peace is also a very powerful tool. With this world today to take time to find your peace can be crazy. But I encourage you to forgive then notice the feeling you have when you do. Sometimes it is just a hint of peace or a full blown case of peace. I hope for you that you might feel the way you breathe pay attention to it take the time to notice how you are breathing fast, slow, scary, hard to breathe, or loose and free. How to tell how you are breathing, If it is fast you may feel light headed out of breathe and anxious. If it is scary you might feel the same as fast breathing, with more intense feeling. Slow- you may feel the breathe leaving your body and replenishing your body. you are more relaxed. Hard to breathe you may have a feeling of drowning, panic and out of control kinda like a asthma attack,( at this point you are pushing yourself to far back off ease your breathing you are not ready for this step) If you feel loose and free like bonds holding you down are gone. With each breathe you feel more at ease and peace is coming in.
Like forgiveness try to find peace in small things. What makes you free? Art? Gardening? Arts and crafts? Volunteering? Prayer? Walking in Nature? anything that makes you feel free and at peace will be a good grounding tool.
Peace for me can be hard I have to have a grounding tool a place I am safe and can work on my breathing and how I am feeling. My greatest tool is walking in nature or working on a garden. Sometimes writing here is a good tool too. I do not speak of what I do not know. I have spent many years working on these things and if I can pass them on to someone who may gain from it the better.
Here is a poem I strongly believe in may give you a starting point.


Desiderata
A Poem of Peace – Truth –Spirit – Life

Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there maybe in silence.
As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons
Speak your truth quietly and clearly, and listen to others even the dull and ignorant; they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit. If you compare your self with others, you may become vain and bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of times. Exercise cautions in your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about life; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is perennial as the grass
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself yourself with imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars: you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you , no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore, be at peace with Yahwey, and whatever your labours and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul
With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams
it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.
Max Ehrmann in 1920’s