We may think about achieving inner peace as a journey where the result is reached at the end, feeding the illusion of acquiring a permanent characteristic of the self. Inner peace is not permanent but part of the adapting process to establish balance between what we have within, and what we receive from the outside. If we receive little or no negativity from the outside, the task of finding balance within becomes easier but still challenging. On the other hand, if we are charged with huge amounts of negative energy, such a task of finding balance requires generating enough positive energy to bring balance to the table. In both situations, what we have is the impermanent exchange of energy with the goal of being light in the present moment.


Becoming light is what we seek but dealing with darkness is what we need to do in the present moment. How could we deal with darkness and become light at the same time? That is a tough question I have no way to provide a general answer to. However, we can perform a little reflection about the subject.


Let us imagine we are producing a result, such as writing a text like the one you are reading in the present moment. Let us also imagine an environment with a group of persons, who the majority does not recognise that the authorship of a given text is owned by a given person, reaching such a lack of recognition not by proof but belief. It may be easier to think about such an example back in the times of slavery, puting the group of persons as the society, and the author of the text as a slave. 


In any given moment of history when slavery was allowed as a common and legal practise, anything produced by a slave, mainly creative work like writing a text, could have the authorship attributed to someone else but the true author, whom was in "an inferior position". Slaves were considered figures with no rights and all obligations.


By putting the self in the perspective of a slave, and imagining the huge amount of negative energy received by a person in such a situation, we may find difficult to belief that any slave was capable of doing anything by his/her own. The society was conditioned to think like that, dropping off consciousness, and implying that any result produced by a slave was disregarded until the authorship of such a result could be attributed to someone else, other slaves excluded.


By walking through history, we find ourselves enjoying wonderful pieces of texts where authors identify themselves with pseudonyms, fearing that society finds out who they really are before reaching a comfortable position only money could buy. Wait? Are we still talking about times of slavery? Let us find out by getting back to the present moment. Well, it seems we still use such a practise of anonymisation, inherited from the times of slavery, and the majority of us has no consciousness about that. Why does the majority of us keep the fear of showing the authorship of our own work, performed with our own efforts? If you have though about racism and discrimination, inherithed from times of slavery, please, ring the bell.


The last recognised Buddha, Siddhārtha Gautama, was a nobleman who had left the palace of his family in a journey of understanding his own suffering. In such a journey, he has put himself in "an equal position of a slave" in his time, attempting to understand how to achieve peace of mind, even receiving so much negative energy. When Siddhārtha Gautama has become the Buddha, he has realised what we call the three jewels of Buddhism, the refugee we could seek in Buddha himself, the Dharma (doctrine/teachings), and the Sangha (the community/society). The doctrine is clear as crystal that any person is capable of achieving peace of mind, and an associated buddhahood state, as a consequence of his/her own efforts of practising the path towards a meaningful life; slaves included. That is our true love nature as human beings, and that is the way of liberation from suffering.


Now, I myself could ask you: Do you believe I am the author of the words you have just read? Do you have proof on the contrary? Have you asked me about the authorship of the text you are just reading? Have you asked me how I came out with such words? Let us think about how conditioned we are of jumping into conclusions before reaching understanding.


The moment we are able to understand the true meaning of a belief, it is the moment we have achieved peace of mind. However, peace of mind is not a permanent state but the result of practising our mind training in order to become light while dealing with darkness, all along in the present moment.


Namaste 💓💓💓💓💓💓💓



Written by Jeferson Souza (thejefecomp).


Available also in a signed pdf version: https://drive.google.com/file/d/13DYJCzEICm_yGxNiYs4MPBP4WF1hjjWE/view?usp=sharing

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