If there’s a God, I imagine God being filled with peace. When we look to nature, there’s a peacefulness in the way the sun or moon rises, there’s a way it feels when we listen to the ocean, or stand in the forest or on a mountain. When we bask in the bloom of wildflowers in the deep desert, or boat down a river, we know that there’s great peace at the very heart of life.
Here’s a strange thought for you. God can’t only be filled with peace. God must be filled with war as well. My mind works in paradox, requiring me to state the opposite to see if it’s true. What if humans are made in God’s image? Then God must rape, torture, and murder as well. Some religions blame this on the devil or evil. God must ultimately be responsible for that as well, if God is the creator of all things. When we look to nature, we have predators and prey. Animals kill each other everyday, just as humans do. We also have tremendous violence and destruction on earth with volcanoes, earthquakes, fires, and storms.
Violence is a part of life. War and strife is linked inside of us. Yet peace feels deeply right. When I have peak experiences, they settle in peace. I feel the oneness in all things and my intense connection to it all. I know I will die. I appreciate every waking moment I have to live. There’s peace in knowing all this.
Peace washes over me like a gentle ocean wave caressing my naked body. We came into this world naked. We will leave this world with nothing. There’s nothing that I need to carry. No worry is too great for the peace of God. This peace fills every fiber of my being and I know that I’m here to be free. I’m here to embody a deep peace.
My former fiance dedicates her life to peace. She wants peace for all beings, and I believe this is a fully noble goal. At the time we were together, I didn’t fully appreciate how profound her focus on peace is. I saw peace as less holistic than love. Now I believe they are equals. Her orientations to peace and my orientations to truth seemed to be in conflict. She said, “Won’t you just let me be and we can both find peace.” I replied, “No, I don’t want peace. I want honesty and truth.” I fought with her for a year and three months to fight for the truth of our love. That’s exactly how long my heart wanted to fight. Now my heart is done fighting. I give up and I allow the truth that is here to be here. Until our love flows again mutually, I let the peace of God hold us in the palm of its hand. (I believe God is both femine, masculine, and beyond gender.).
May this peace wash over every aspect of my heart and mind. May it flow into all that I perceive. The deepest heartbreak of my life has brought me to the deepest peace. As I let it run its course and work inside of me, I now find such a tremendous peace as I have never known. All things come home in the end. We are all in our right place. If eternity is happening now, then all that is, is an intricate web of an unfolding pattern.
Just as our last breath of life flows out of us, everything is finished in peace. The peace of God is found in the heart. It comes from the great act of surrender. The ego tries to struggle and hold on for dear life. When we let go and trust, we find peace is available to us now.
There’s nothing we have to do. All we have in this dance of life is the force of life flowing through us. One day this force shall carry us into the world beyond this life. The ego is the force that makes things unpeaceful. The ego fights wars with reality, defends its position and attempts to prove it’s right. Sometimes the being fights wars too. The being only fights necessary battles. These are the battles of the heart for truth and love. Letting these wars happen when they happen and finding the peace in the heart amidst all the chaos is the way of fierce love.
I do not wish to ever fight. It’s never my preference. I am like Arjuna before the great battle, from the Bhagavad Gita, the great Hindu text. Yet, Krishna counsels Arjuna to fight. Some fights are necessary or destined and so most of the Bhagavad Gita is Krisha counseling Arjuna on why he must fight. When we are warriors for love, we do not fight for pleasure. We fight for our being. Arjuna entered the battle with humility and grief, knowing his enemies are just like him. He can not rejoice in their death. He can not take pleasure in their suffering. He can not rejoice in the suffering of those he loves. These sacred stories teach us that peace is not pacifism. Peace is the way the being responds to what is true for it in the moment. Opening to our deeper being sometimes we will have to fight for what we feel is true. And yet even when we fight, from this place, the fight arises out of peace.
When we open the door to our deeper being, peace washes over us like an ocean wave. I wish for us all to fight the peace deeply embedded in our heart. Join me in living from the peace of the heart. May everything in your life be finished in peace. If you are really lucky, you will feel this peace in the beginning of everything you start. I hope this peace pervades all aspects of your life. I love you so much! Let’s end with a prayer for peace. As the peace poles inspired by Masahisa Goi say, “May Peace Prevail on Earth.” Now and forever, it is finished in peace. What if this deep peace is not just the peace of God, but God itself. May we rest in God. As an agnostic for all his life, my father left this world riding on the Islamic prayer, “La ilaha ‘ill Allah” which translates into English, “All is God, there is nothing but God.”
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