Peace

Perhaps I have chosen a heavy topic to talk about. Perhaps I should choose to state my opinions about something that is not so controversial. I will be doubted and frowned upon when I say this — but I dare to — nobody and yes nobody has understood what peace is. As the whole process of actually understanding it defeats the purpose of peace, which is being peaceful. But here’s my attempt to reach PEACE.

Chaos and peace complement each other in a quite oxymoron fashion. If devoid of peace, your mind and soul are in chaos and another way around, you are filled with peace if not in chaos. And it makes perfect sense!! The goal should be to strive for peace and keep yourself away from chaos. The only problem is — like any other conundrum that we are a part of such as “uncertainty is the ultimate certainty” and “Smooth sea never shaped great sailors” — “Peace is found only in chaos” — is another of those realities.

It’s one thing to be able to have the option to give up societal norms, relationships, materialistic belongings and attain peace, then is to be the part of society that refutes your thinking ideologies, to be surrounded by people that regard perfect self-presentation over self-love and self- value and then be able to attain peace engrossed by hundred activities that demand one’s attention at a moment.

What I think would be the ultimate challenge for determining if one has found peace is to leave a person for a month in a “crazy house” with people that understand no logic, make no logic, and won’t allow you to act logically. That knowledge of peace is the ultimate attainment of peace. While creating such a situation to test one’s level of peace attained is impossible, another way to test is to “be peaceful every day”. As simple as these four words sound, nothing and I repeat — nothing can be more difficult than understanding the four words. “Being peaceful every day”.

It’s not about sitting for 15 minutes for an app guided mediation and neither to similarly allocate a specific time slot for mindful thinking that I believe is the path to reach peace.

There is a key similarity that can be seen common in many facts such as — practice makes a man perfect, a person who is happy with himself makes another happy too, dieting won’t make you healthy, eating healthy as a part of your lifestyle forever that doesn’t feel forced but becomes a second habit will make you healthy, genius become so by reading over and over again -many books over decades in their lifetime.

The key fact governing the commonality between all of it — is “A notion only becomes one’s truth of life — when it becomes one’s second nature”. And that’s why peace surely can be achieved through meditation. But forcibly allotting a time slot to sit and try to curb and simply cease from thinking anything, while later returning to one’s chaotic life won’t help in SUSTAINING such peace. Neither will not being persistent after seeing some quick fails of no result post meditating for just one week will help reach PEACE.

The only thing that remains is — the 5-act rule — which should be followed until it becomes second nature. It’s a mind guide that will help grow and then eventually reach PEACE.

1. Start a meditation routine that you want to master — and remember it’s a new onset or time commitment for your entire life. Not just a job you plan to start today and will end tomorrow. Starting with the right mentality will always help.

2. Make it a “mini-habit” and meditate for at least 5 mins to half an hour every day for the first month. Keeping it a mini habit helps in not skipping any day. No excuses can be found to not find time even for 5 minutes.

3. Now move it to a “major-habit” group and practice meditation for at least half an hour every day. Keep a 60-second journal to just record if anything new you learned or maybe you were able to think less, or maybe you were able to gain the ability to view oneself in the third-person perspective, which made you analyze yourself less harshly and thus made you one step closer to “PEACE”.

4. And now make it a “major-habit” until it becomes second nature — similar to how one can’t stop brushing their teeth every day or sleeping or eating or even breathing!! That should be the case with meditating, and that’s the goal.

5. And now comes the time to start implementing the habit of meditating every time. Does that mean — sitting in a yogic position — looking for silence — and trying to curb one’s thinking 24*7*365? No!! It means being able to make peace one’s “ground state” aka “natural state of mind”, which will eventually cut through the chaos.

Flowing through this stream of actions will then help in the long run to not get angry, and rather be peaceful when faced by a problem and then slowly and logically try to analyze and come to a solution. It will also prevent from being in a state of continual depression or loneliness or hopelessness and then reach the state of nirvana or bliss or peace.

It’s then when maybe some deeper essences of understanding the meaning of life will make a permanent shift in our thinking patterns.

And to answer the question!! What I peace?

Peace is everywhere and nowhere. Its everything and nothing. It’s the idea of being uncertain but beautiful, it’s the idea to live to die but accept death as much as accepting life. It will all make sense. Am I there yet? no !! But I am trying and so lets all of us !!