If we wish to find peace we must understand something of its life. Here are a few such facts: Peace is the natural radiation of a living Now; it is one with that Light whose life is the eternal present itself, even as the emanations of light and warmth are one with the sun from which they radiate. If our intuition can perceive that the above ideas are based in truth, then we should be naturally moved to ask the following question: If this peace we long for is inherent in this perfectly present moment we call the "Now," what is it that keeps us from knowing the fulfillment of its promise within us? Let's look.

Through even casual observation, we can see that the primary governing body of our present self seems to be a mental and emotional construct whose sole occupation in life seems to be an ongoing consideration of what was and what will be. This activity amounts to what we experiences as an endless weighing of our past and subsequent planning of our future. Stated in another way, our lives are currently made up of what we name for ourselves as being good days or bad days. Of course these "good" and "bad" days are labeled as such based on how they measure up to our desired expectations. Good days "happen" when we get what we desire, and bad days are... well, you know!

Now, one of the strange features about this present nature of ours is that even on "good" days -- when we manage to achieve what we desire and feel a sense of satisfaction -- this conditional peace often turns against us; triumph becomes a kind of torment as we end up fearing we will lose the thing just gained. Poof goes our peace! There is no profit in it, and its promises are equally empty.

We have another nature, one whose life and whose peace are the same character. This order of Self, and the Now that is the backdrop of its being, are as the branch is to the life-giving vine. No true peace can survive apart from this relationship. Any other form of peace is its earthly expression. But to make the point: No order, no peace. Order is peace.

This peace confounds the lower level of mind that only knows stillness by what it imagines its qualities to be. The mind asleep to itself -- and hence to the reality of the stillness spoken of earlier upon which life is seen dancing -- cannot conceive how its own images of winning in life deny it the victory over life for which it longs. In order to know peace and its promise, we must release ourselves from this sleeping self that is always struggling to put pieces of peace together in the vain hope they will stay united!

We have all tried sewing pieces of peace together, thinking through what we must do to rid ourselves of whatever nags at us. You know the dialogue one is ever having with oneself.

"Hopefully this career change will make things better; maybe going to the gym will get my love life going; once I make him understand my point of view..." "As soon as" becomes the chant and the source of our confidence. We all know how this goes. The chattering is as endless as one's fear of feeling empty. And the more of these "pieces of peace" we juggle, the more anxious we become, all the while hoping that life won't break up what we would assemble. Even through this approach has proven itself fruitless, still we cling to the hope that next time things will be different. What we must see is that our lives cannot change until we do -- from the inside out.

To succeed in our quest, we need a new and higher understanding of our own being. For this peace that we seek resides within us; it is not to be found anywhere else, which leads us to the next step in our search. To enter the silent world of peace requires that we learn the secret of being still. We must discover and enter into our own still being.

The task before us is not an easy one, and anyone who tells you differently lies; but we are not asked to make this journey without a guide. Before us goes the Light of Truth. It reveals the Way by opening our eyes to see among other truths, that the peace we seek is not a thing created by us. We learn that admission into its celestial kingdom is by mutual consent only, even though this peace agrees to no terms other than its own. It makes the rules, not us. Yet we are eventually made grateful for these unyielding laws, for whatever soul agrees to bend its will to these terms of eternal peace not only finds God's peace revealed, but also that this providence has now become a permanent presence within his or her heart.

Recognizing the need for God in your life is the beginning of His entrance into it. And, as His is always the initiating action, what may feel like your need is really His secret invitation -- announcing itself as a hunger in the heart which nothing in the world can sate. How you respond to this interior invitation determines the speed in which He makes Himself known to you. And the best response of all is to be in waiting to respond -- for assuming this internal position means that your wish to be receptive outweighs that ancient anchor called worldly concerns. And should this elevated level of Higher Self receptivity seem impossibly distant for now, it doesn't have to remain that way because you can change your level. Which brings us to the purpose of this set of specialized instructions: The work of strengthening spiritual memory.

What is Spiritual Memory? Spiritual Memory is that part of your mind through which God first reminds you of His Life. A moments study proves this important spiritual finding. In your search for the Higher Life you've no doubt come upon a Truth and suddenly felt as though you had known the truth of it all your life; only that somehow you'd forgotten it! This wonderful awakening sensation is like unexpectedly running into and recognizing a long lost friend. And, in a sense, this is exactly what has happened; for in each such moment of higher remembering -- where you know afresh some Truth once lost to you -- you have also refreshed your relationship with that Truth's Source: God. This discovery can now be stated more succinctly: Strengthening your Spiritual memory helps awaken you to that Mind which holds it, and that Mind eventually reveals itself as being within and a part of God's Mind. What this new Truth reveals is that each and every time we can remember to remember God, it's the same as receiving, increasing, and accepting God's invitation to make His Life your own. Do your best to employ the 10 exercises below in their appropriate moment, and don't be the least bit concerned over the results. You can't fail at this exercise. Every effort you make to remember to remember God increases His interest in you. And God always gets what He wants!

1. Remembering to remember God when doing needful business with another person will also remind you that not only is it impossible to serve two masters and hope to succeed -- but that Real Success comes to you as you see the truth of this.

2. Remembering to remember God when someone starts to praise you will keep you from forgetting that whatever light you may have shown to win that applause is only a gifted reflection.

3. Remembering to remember God in the middle of condemning yourself reminds you that you are much too harsh to be your own judge and that there's a Higher Court of Appeal whose verdict is the standing order to start your life all over.

4. Remembering to remember God when taking your meals will help keep you from abandoning yourself to that nature which always abandons you after its consumed its desire.

5. Remembering to remember God in your travels reveals that wherever you may be going your dwelling place is always where your heart is and that no place is ever any better or worse than what you bring into it.

6. Remembering to remember God while being lashed about by your own storming thoughts and feelings makes it evident that you do not have to stand out in the rain.

7. Remembering to remember God in the face of a fear or loss reminds you that you've a choice in what you cling to, and that letting go of what is pulling you down is the same as turning in a higher, happier direction.

8. Remembering to remember God in the midst of a conflict or dispute helps to clarify that you can either go on fighting over what is impermanent -- or -- you can fight for your spiritual freedom by walking away from that inner neurotic nature and its compulsive need to win.

9. Remembering to remember God when doing those things you wish you didn't have to do connects you with Something that is always content to be right where it is because it is always pleased with Who it is.

10. Remembering to remember God when doubting that remembering God does you any good places your wish for what is true above your own suspicion that you may not be sincere -- which is the beginning of True Spiritual Sincerity.

There is an endless hole in the heart of most of us; a pit that demands our faithful daily service and that causes us, in our compulsion to fill it, to be pitiless towards those who stand in the way of this endless ambition. Most of us will spend our lives as slaves to this psychic abyss, driven in one form or another to satisfy in ourselves what can only be satisfied by our continuing struggle. But it need not be this way. We can be free of this futility; released from the meaninglessness of mindlessly, mercilessly, working for what lives only to perpetuate itself at the cost of our happiness. Such freedom has a cost. One's self must be known, its inhabitants realized.

All desire is mindless, meaning that this force of life arises out of powers that are subtler than even the most complex mental formulations that we can derive about them. But their present power over us -- that leads us to pleasure only to leave us in pain -- may be understood by a Light within us that lives beyond desire's irrepressible influence; a Life that is free of ambition and all of its aching because this awakened Wisdom understands, sees clearly, the impossibility of escaping from something that doesn't exist.

The following Key Lessons are advanced studies in ending the ache of ambition. Certainly the world around you, and most likely the world within you will take exception to the truths about to be revealed. Never mind the negative. What does not want you to see what is must cast its blackness to keep itself hidden. Nothing can hide from the Light of Truth. Our willingness to see by its Light is what leads us out of our petty, puny and self-punishing life, returning us into the Heart of Real Life where love and innocence rule side by side. We can begin by asking ourselves this next question... and answering it with all the honesty we can muster:

Who suffers more? The one who fails to become what his socially conditioned mind imagines is success -- so that he loathes his own life -- or the one who becomes successful as defined (and demanded) by his culture, and who then struggles the rest of his life to keep that condition in place? Once we see that both of these individuals suffer the same fate, but only call their aching by different names, then we will realize the possibility of a truly successful life! Now study these next 5 Key Lessons until their light sets you upon the Path to Freedom.

Waiting and struggling to finally become what one imagines will fulfill him is the secret avoidance of being what one is. Wanting to avoid what one is is the nullification of relationship with what is. Nothing can become something out of nothing, which explains perfectly why whatever it may be that we struggle to fill ourselves with today leaves us feeling so empty tomorrow.

All acts of "kindness" upon the path of one who is "becoming" are not acts of kindness at all, but clever contrivances on the part of his ambitious self to ensure that others will help him in his never-ending struggle to obtain his stated goal.

What is our impatience with others if not our negative reaction to their un-informed interference with our plan for reaching an imagined perfection!

There can never be any real rest for the one who feels that he must become more than he is, and here is why: the conditioned mind that drives him to achieve its desire no sooner experiences the sensations it imagined it would, then it must set out again in search of that source of stimulation that it has given to itself by naming, yet again, something else to become.

We give our ambitions great names because without the pleasure of these pre-packed sensations stored away within our own precious self-images, we would have to stand there, bare, seeing the fact that such endless ambition is only the futile attempt to escape the fear of emptiness.

The usual, or sensual mind, is always seeking experience. Its primary source of this "food" needed to sustain itself is the unconscious chain of reaction that constitutes mechanical, associative thought.

The hunger this nature has for this food is that with each reaction there occurs within it a certain contraction that is both painful and pleasurable for it. Pleasurable because this contraction creates a momentary sense of self, a "false" self created from being in opposition to what it considers. The painful aspect of this contraction is that all such actions cut off, or isolate, the nature in experience of it -- which becomes a source of suffering for it -- in that this same nature also longs to reach a state of wholeness.

While experience may serve as the path to self-knowledge, still it remains the lesser half of the path to self-knowing. Self-knowing is not experiential. It has no one apart from itself. It does not take place in time.

Self-knowing requires risking the self that fears being no one; a "risk" that becomes an inevitable choice once the seeker sees that all pursuit of experience, whose root is secret self-confirmation, is powerless to bring an end to his sense of isolation and loneliness.

Following are 9 insights and instructions to help you begin placing your wish for true self-knowing over the experience-seeking sensual mind.

1. The mind that asks what's the best use of my time seeks forms of familiar stimulation (which it calls being industrious) so it never considers that what would be best for it would be to quietly explore its own self-induced desires.

2. The mind that asks what's the best use of my time is trying to hide from itself the fact of its own essential emptiness.

3. The mind that asks what's the best use of my time wants to be, and in its own agitated effort to become fails to see that for it to exist at all proves that Something already is.

4. The mind that asks what's the best use of my time will willingly pour itself into a thousand meaningless actions rather than see, once, the futility of its own pursuits.

5. The mind that asks what's the best use of my time excludes, by the limited field of its own perception the possibility that, in reality, there exists no time outside of its own point by point considerations, and therefore ... that there is no place to reach, no separate self to complete, and so ... nothing to do.

6. The mind that asks what's the best use of my time can't consider that the best use of its "time" would be to see into the unconscious movement of its own thought process as it creates not only the question of its own "best use", but also the self it needs to search for the answer to its question.

7. The mind that asks what's the best use of my time sees being alone and unoccupied as states having no value, to be avoided at all costs, because its only system of self-evaluation requires the ongoing presence of the opposites.

8. The mind that asks what's the best use of my time is a mind in pursuit of those sensations produced by time; i.e., the sense of running from one point to another (from thought to thought) for the sense of self that this movement of time creates.

9. The mind that asks what's the best use of my time seeks experience, and because of its own conditioned nature is unable to see that what it really wants is: the unexperienced -- a state of itself that cannot be sought.