Peace starts within

“World peace must come through inner peace”

– Dalai Lama –

I went to see the Dalai Lama in Sydney yesterday with my friends and this was one of the messages that he had to share with us. Peace starts within. 

After he had given his talk Beyond Religion (Ethical Mindfulness in Every Day Life) on the benefits of living ethically, he answered questions for about 45 minutes and one of the questions that came in was “How do we, or I, have an impact on today’s world, when there is so much violence and religious tension? What can we do as an individual?”

And his answer? “Real change, at a global level, must come from the individual. Not through the United Nations or European Parliament. . . we as individuals must start.”

And he went on to say “World peace, must come through inner peace.”

And this is something that has taken me a little while to get my head around. However, through my spiritual journey of late and from reading a fair amount on Buddhism, some of the Dalai Lama’s books like ‘The Art of Happiness’ and most recently Mr Eckhart Tolle’s books, the penny has dropped.

Our thoughts create our reality. Therefore, if we are not at peace inside and in our head, the reality that we experience will not be peaceful.

And it’s very interesting, because the more calmer I have become in my body and in my head, the calmer my life has become. The more love I have given to myself, the more love I have experienced in my life. And the more peace I have found inside, the more peace I have started to witness in my external life.

To some, it might sound too simple, but the beauty and brilliance of this notion, is that it really is that easy.

If for any reason we don’t like what we are experiencing in our external world, all we need to do is look inside and start to change what is happening in the thoughts in our head and the feelings in our bodies, and watch how our external world changes accordingly.

If our life is too fast and too crazy, we need to slow our thoughts down through meditation or yoga perhaps. If our life is sad, angry, or frustrating, we need to be kinder and more loving to ourselves through the thoughts we are thinking, and watch how everything external to us starts to change.

And most importantly, if we are looking for peace in the world, rather than running around trying to change everything outside of us, we must look inwards and seek to be more peaceful in our thoughts and feelings. We need to be the change we desire to see in the world.

You can see the Dalai Lama answering this specific question in the below You Tube clip around 2 hours 47.

Sending you lots of love, hugs and light,

Kat x x x

Inspiration for this post

Ethical Mindfulness in Everyday Life, The 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet Sydney Public Talk

Put your head through the clouds

 

blue-sky thinking

World Dictionary definition – (n) ‘creative ideas that are not limited by current thinking or beliefs’

I’m a big fan of meditation, and I’m always looking for new techniques and advice. So when Leonie told me about Cloud Meditation over a deliciously cold Ginger Ale on Friday afternoon, as we enjoyed the Sydney sunshine down at Circular Quay I got pretty excited.

When I asked what Cloud Meditation was, she told me that all you needed to do was simply focus all of your energy and attention on a cloud in the sky and it would gradually disappear into nothingness.

Now when she told me, in that moment I felt a little torn. Part of me thought that it was an amazing concept and notion, the other part of me thought it was a little bonkers. I mean, come on, how could you make a cloud disappear, by just focussing your mind on it?? And despite my slight scepticism, secretly, I wanted it to be possible.

So, being the ever curious bunny that I am, I tried it out on the Manly ferry as I journeyed into the city to TEDx yesterday. I was in a very happy place, sitting at the back of the big boat, enjoying the trip as we swung into the harbour and headed for the wharf. The sun was on my face, Ellie Goulding was in my ears, I was just about to head to TEDx and all was right with the world.

So, what better an opportunity to see if I could do a spot of Cloud Meditation and see if I could make a cloud disappear.

I thought I would start with an easy one, so I focussed on one that was pretty small. And, sure enough, after a few minutes of careful focus and concentration it had disappeared. Wow! I could barely my eyes! Maybe it was a fluke? Maybe that cloud was going to disappear anyway? So I tried a bigger one. Again, I focussed all of my energy on it, and sure enough, the more I focussed on it, the more parts of it started to break away and disappear into nothingness. And minute, by minute as we pulled into Wharf 3, the cloud was disappearing before my very eyes.

Now, anyone sitting next to me would perhaps have started to wonder why this bespectacled blonde girl was sitting with her mouth and eyes wide open, staring at the sky in disbelief. In fact, the two ladies sitting next to me started to look up at the sky to try to work out what it was that I was looking at. And when they couldn’t work it out, got up to leave the ferry.

I was on the brink of tears, I honestly couldn’t believe that just by concentrating my mind, I had managed to make clouds disintegrate. It was so amazing, and further proof that The Law of Attraction does indeed work, and that we can achieve anything if we put our mind to it.

Still, feeling a tad sceptical and disbelieving today, I told my boyfriend about what had happened and for a few minutes focussed my attention (and his) on some clouds in the sky and watched them disappear too.

So, I just wanted to share this really beautiful meditation with you as I know it is something that I will start to do much more regularly. And invite you to give Cloud Meditation a try for yourself.

Inspiration for this post

My beautiful friend Leonie & Cloud Meditation