Peace Is Always at Hand: 5 Ways to Know It
Peace is always at hand. The pandemic is not over. The presidential election is some 90 days away. The economy is fraught with tension.
Photo by Simon Migaj on Unsplash
Peace, though, is always at hand.
I believe the key to finding peace is simply knowing, believing that peace is always at hand. Peace is always within us. We are peace, each of us. We are the same peace. The peace that is love. That is joy. And that is harmony. Peace that is Spirit.
If we allow ourselves to relax just long enough, we can bring our awareness into contact with that peace. Therefore, if we take a break from all the thinking about what is going wrong. Don’t worry about it going away if you’re not worrying about it. Because, it will be there for your worry when you get back…if you want it to be.
Peace Is Always at Hand
Let me offer you 5 simple practices to make your way to peace. observe, breathe, move, be still, pray. Emphasis on the word “practices”. The more you practice each and all of them, then the more proficient you will become and the more peace you will experience. The more proficient you become, then the more likely that you will make each or all of these your regular practice.
Five Ways to Peace
Observe. Although there is more beauty and more wonder in the physical world than we can experience in all our life., there is not too much to observe for just a few minutes. Select something you will enjoy looking at. For 3-5 minutes simply observe. Observe closely each detail. View broadly its entire scope. Look at it. Look into it. See how it must have been before. See how it might become after. The more often you practice this, the more ways you will discover and create to observe. Hold what you observe in your memory.
Breathe. Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, pay attention to your breath and your breathing. Notice the rhythm of your breathing. Change the rhythm and pay attention to the difference. Play with breathing. Give meaning or metaphor to inhaling and different meaning or metaphor to the exhaling. Don’t rush. Take your time breathing and focusing on breathing, feeling breathing when you concentrate on it. Hold the calm that breathing brings.
Move. Without any regard for the “right way” to move, just move. Pay attention to what your body parts do and how they work in such wonderful unison. Notice how the movement, the attention to your movement, brings you joy and that the joy is peace. Run. Walk. Swim. Dance. Hop. Stretch. Skip. Roll. Jump. Wave. Sway.
Be Still. This is stillness not of your body only, but of your senses, your thinking. Remove yourself from all distractions. Be mindful of being at rest. Still. At peace. Concentrate on the absence of motion, of doing. Focus on the fact that at this moment you are doing nothing except being. Free yourself from thinking how much work goes into being. The world around you may be moving at the rate of three times hubbub. For these few moments you do not have to. You do not want to. And so you do not. You are still.
Pray. To pray is to communicate with Spirit. That communication happens in an infinite number of ways. It may be spoken but it does not have to be. It may be written but it does not have to be. Praying can be silent or aloud. It can be in motion or at rest. Praying is simply and wonderfully your awareness that you know the presence of Spirit and you know Spirit is aware of you. That is communication with Spirit. To magnify the power of praying to let you know peace may be to make time for praying. To consciously know that as you pray—no matter the focus or the content of your praying—you bring the peace you are to the surface of your being. Consider that the other four ways to peace are praying in themselves.
Praying because Peace Is Always at Hand
Power. Presence. Peace.
How wonderful to know full well You are, I am, We are.
Thank you, Good Friend, from whom I come, with which I am made,
for giving me the power and the presence that come from peace.
I thank you, too, for allowing me to know and to practice
simple joys that pull peace to my surface being,
as I know your peace is always present within me.
With comfort and grace I expect and respect your gentle guidance
in the things I do that I may know
that peace is always at hand. I do this
by observing peace in so many forms,
from breathing the full complement of peace continually,
when moving with peace and through peace and as peace,
by being still in the presence and with the fullness of peace,
thanks to praying from peace and for peace.
Thank you, Spirit, for the peace I am and share and have.
And so it is, and so celebrate the Christ within. Amen.
Love & blessings,
17 August 2020
In: Beauty, Breath, Inner Peace, Peace, Prayer, Praying · Tagged with: Peace, Prayer, praying
RSS - Posts