Whenever we find ourselves identified with some dark stream of thoughts and feelings, as opposed to being quietly aware of their downward-trending presence, we fall -- in that same moment -- into a world filled with unwanted negative states.
Question: I have been troubled about the upcoming war, the battle of Armageddon that seems about to begin. I see the folly of starting such a conflict but recognize that protesting it is equal folly. What can we do in such a situation?
Answer: You're in the right place to understand the following instruction: War in this world is a reflection of the unseen war in each of us. Before there can be peace on earth, each of us must understand this spiritual truth.
With this in mind, find all the different ways in your day you can let the conflict or violence end with you. An example: Someone says something cruel. Don't fire back a "missile." Bear the darkness within you and it ceases to affect the world outside of you. That is change, you are changed, and the world changes.
The reason so much of what's going on within and around us seems "bad" is because that's all we can see. Just as beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so it is true when it comes to all our inner states, including fear, depression, and bitterness. In such moments, having become bound up in thoughts and feelings we don't want, and then seeing a world that confirms our sense of captivity, we literally forget that none of what we're going through is necessary.
The only reason that we're standing in that storm of negative states is because we've fallen asleep! We've forgotten who we really are, including our divine right to call upon a power that instantly transports us out of harm's way. Anytime we can remember to do so, we are free to wake up and return to our true home -- within us -- beyond the reach of fear, doubt, or any other dark state.
If our wish is to walk freely through this world without fear of sudden storms -- to know that we have an interior home whose light cannot be breached by any darkness -- then our task is clear: First, we must see how this spiritual amnesia blinds us and then binds us in a prison of false perceptions induced by having fallen spiritually asleep.
Nothing in the universe can take from you your right to be spiritually free; it is a divine gift, which means that anytime you find yourself struggling to escape the grip of a negative state, it's only because you're in a dream from which you have yet to awaken. There's only one real prescription that has the power to end your pain: you must shake yourself awake from the forgetfulness that has caused you to forget your immortal Self.
