As human beings we form relationships and then, when the form or dynamic of these relationships change, as they must, we blame these unwanted changes for our loss of peace. Such behavior is like getting mad at the wind that catches our hat and whisks it away. Our sense of lost peace, along with feeling the loss of one's freedom that was tied to it, has never had anything to do with peace with...

There is one essential ingredient missing in most of our relationships -- one that is definitely required if we wish to continue in our own development and help others to do the same. What is this powerful catalyst that only we can provide for each other? Room in which to grow. We can help others reach higher by simply agreeing, consciously, to give them space to go through their changes ev...

Truth wants you to know that it is never in your best interest to unconsciously suffer, no matter how inwardly convincing it may feel to you that you will be betraying yourself or someone else if you don't. The only way that any suffering feeling can prove to you that you need it is to hypnotize you with a flood of itself. Step back from yourself. Learn instead to listen to the quiet stream of...

The best time to practice going quiet -- to detect and drop dark inner voices -- is when the world around you is more or less already in a natural state of silence. So, early morning, upon arising, and just before you go to sleep, are the most likely times to yield the best results. But, as you'll no doubt come to discover for yourself, any time is the right time to go quiet. Find a place...

No one can hope to know the joy of true personal freedom without knowing the truth of spiritual peace. Freedom and peace are as kite and wind; the former remains grounded without the latter. This is to say that before we will feel ourselves being lifted above the conflict and illusions of this world, peace must become conscious within us. Peace is the foundation, freedom the form built upon it...

The meditative life is not limited to sitting down someplace quietly, nor is it limited to someplace in time where we can control conditions so that we can experience something of a quiet mind. It can be said that meditation is the active relationship that an individual has with the whole of his or her life. Indeed, if we were able to see clearly enough into our own life, we would see some...

Isn't it true that the minute something happens, there is a reaction that takes place to the event, and the reaction forms as a stimulus by which we then want to figure out how to resolve this pain that we're in, fix the person, or change the condition so that the disturbance we're feeling will go away? This means that in the moment where there is disturbance, we are meeting the disturbance w...

A man who doesn't know his true identity does not know that he doesn't really know. The fact that he is confused, frightened and still searching for himself remains almost totally unsuspected by him because he has unknowingly assumed a false identity. This temporary, false self feels real because it is animated and driven along by the man's reactions as he seeks himself. The fact that thi...

Doesn't this make perfect sense? If we need to be rescued from something, then whatever is rescuing us can't be part of what it rescues us from. Said in a different way, you don't jump on a tiger's back to escape a lion. A terrified rabbit running from a fox only thinks he finds safety when a coyote offers him shelter. This shows us that any desperate attempt to escape a trouble usually leads...

Every person knows what it feels like to be carried off by an anxious state, so you decide: when some anxiety comes along and takes over your life, are you an awake, inwardly centered person or are you an unconscious, outwardly driven man or woman? Which are you? That you're outwardly directed is pretty obvious. Why? Because that anxious state could not exist without your false belief that who...

How many times in a day do we find ourselves having gone after something that we wanted, only to find ourselves "gotten" or "done in" by what we have reached for? Then what happens? The crying, complaining, bitterness, blaming starts: "Oh, why is this happening to me? This isn't right!" We can't see how we actually participated in producing the moment in which we find ourselves compromised, an...

As surprising as it may be to learn at first, the more "personal" is our peace, the more punishment we are likely to attract from it! Sometimes the simplest things show the deepest truths: Have you ever been in the midst of that personal peace called, "sitting in front of the TV with a nice pizza"? You know what happens next! The phone rings or a neighbor drops by and . . . Boom! One's slice o...