—————————————————————————————
|
No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path. ~Buddha |
—————————————————————————————
Yes, even if Buddha himself were teaching you, he could only tell you what to do to find inner peace. He could not make your mind go through the process required for realizing it.
This is in contrast to what you do when your car is giving trouble. You give it to a mechanic, he fixes it and gives it back to you.
As far as becoming peaceful is concerned, it is DYI: You are the one who has to perform the repair process.
***
What is the repair process for getting inner peace, you may ask.
The process is very simple… I would even say it is failsafe, provided it is performed correctly. The steps involved are:
STEP 1
- BELIEVE that inner peace puts an end to all anxiety, stress, anger and insecurity. It’s the real deal
- BELIEVE that inner peace is already inside you and that you have just forgotten where it is (there is no risk in doing this — thousands, if not millions of people have re-discovered it in the course of human history)
- BELIEVE it is possible for you (and everyone else) to recognize it and abide in it at all times (it needs no special abilities)
- BELIEVE that if you work on attaining it, you will definitely succeed in the course of time.
STEP 2
Locate your true identity (which I call the “basic you”) as follows:
- Go to a place where there will be no distractions for 10 minutes and where you can spend those 10 minutes sitting (or standing) with your eyes closed
- When a thought strikes you, try and locate who was aware of the thought. Do this especially for thoughts involving “I”, like “What am I doing here?”
- That “who’”, which is the “basic you”, is a pure observer of your thoughts. It does nothing else. Since all thoughts are observed by it, they are objects, and in a way external to it like a TV show
- Since it is thoughts that cause anxiety, stress, anger and insecurity, and since all thoughts are external to the “basic you”, the “basic you” does not experience anxiety, stress, anger and insecurity. Which is why it is absolutely calm.
STEP 3
The next step is to learn to abide in that peaceful identity as a base:
- Whenever you remember, ponder on how the last thing you thought was a thought coming and going in front of you, like a scene coming and going on a TV show
- As mentioned earlier, it is most important to do this for thoughts involving “I”, like “I am getting old,” or “I need to buy a new watch,” or “How dare he say that about me”
- In time, this will make you abide in the “basic you”, the still witness of your thoughts, all the time, so that you are aware of your thoughts coming and going in real time, and there is no need for you to ponder about them after they occur (as described above).
You have to perform the three steps yourself. No guru can perform them for you since he does not have direct access to your head. A guru, can, however, give you the tools you need to perform the repair.
Now open your bonnet and get to work!
To your early enlightenment,
