Ending the Inner War

Are we truly willing to end the war? It’s essentially the inner war that is being spoken of here. Can we recognize how we argue with reality? Can we recognize how we make an enemy of our feelings, our thoughts, our experiences? Can we recognize that we are divided within? And what would actually change if we put down our “inner weapons “defense and attack”? This kind of exploration is relevant both to the discovery of the source of peace on the spiritual journey and to the living of peace in our lives and in the world

But before we can look outwards, we must look within. Because that's where it starts.

If we look at the violence, war, greed, and corruption in the world — whether it be domestic abuse, gang warfare, fascist regimes, or the war between nations — from the perspective of awakened consciousness, what we are really looking at is a culmination in humanity of the accumulated ignorance of true nature. In other words, a separation from the source of One Being-ness that we all share. From the perspective of One Being-ness, everything we see and perceive and experience takes place within the field of consciousness … so there really are no “external” or “internal” worlds. It is really one reality, apparently divided into “what’s going on out there” and “what’s going on in here”. We cannot say that the world exists independently of us, because without the capacity of consciousness being conscious through the vehicle of sentient beings, we would not be able to experience what we call the world. 

So before we even ask how can we create a more peaceful world, we must look within … to the root of the divided state. 

Looking within to examine what we argue with in our experiential landscape is the most important step in ending division. What do we make an enemy out of? What do we suppress? What do we banish into the shadow lands? We're conditioned to suppress that which we don't like to feel. But we are “feeling organisms”. The feeling could be hurt, heartbreak, sadness … “ouch!” It could be anger, aloneness, regret. All of these feelings are actually an energy with a texture. Prior to naming them as this feeling or that feeling, they are simply a “felt-sense”. We’re trained to believe — unconsciously or consciously — that any feeling that it is uncomfortable or powerful or intense or seemingly overwhelming is something to push away, to deny, to cover up. It starts in childhood, when our parents tell us not to cry or to stop drawing attention to ourselves. It starts in schools when we’re told to behave. It starts in society where there are spoken and unspoken codes of conduct in order to “fit in”. 

When we make an enemy out of our natural capacity to feel, we maneuvre and contort ourselves into being good or being right or only having positive feelings so that we are approved of, loved, taken care of, and so on. This is the beginning of the move away from our authentic self which is always innocent and natural. As we move away from our natural capacity to feel, we also fall into the unconcsious reflex to compartmentalise our thoughts into “good thoughts”, “bad thoughts”, “positive thoughts”, and “negative thoughts”. Taking a hard stance in opinions, beliefs, and position-taking (“I’m right, you’re wrong”) are also manifestions of the divided state. In this way, we increasingly move away from our our innate wholeness, which is essentially indivisible.

Although it sounds harmless to reject dark or unwelcome feelings and to focus on feeling good or happy, it's not really that harmless. Not only does the suppression of feeling build up an energetic mass we call “emotion” that lives underground waiting to be “triggered”, but it also has an impact on our overall well-being: it lowers our physiological immunity and obscures our true happiness and peace. The habitual tendency to make an enemy of what we feel creates an inner tightness — an inner clenched-ness — that permeates how we relate to ourselves, to others, to the world, and to all life. We become emotionally reactive, ready to go to war with anyone or anything that disagrees or opposes our own version of reality. 

If we’re willing to look within and end the war, we can begin the journey of remembering ourselves as the Being-ness that naturally and innately meets reality as openness. It’s an unconditional relationship to “what is” … “I feel this, and if this is the energy that is here in my experience, then there's no condition on it. It's neither wrong, nor bad, nor dangerous.” In this way, we start to undo or unclench the inner fist that says “No, I don't want to feel this” and then sets up psychological strategies of avoidance. 

But let’s be clear … the unconditional relationship to “what is” doesn't mean that we can never say “No”. There are healthy boundaries, whether that's in an intimate relationship or in relationship to anything that’s going on. And these boundaries are important if we are to avoid harm or abuse or being a victim. Rather, an unconditional relationship opens our capacity to listen. So instead of reacting from a place of blame (whether that's blaming ourselves or blaming another), instead of taking sides (whether that’s within ourselves or against another), we simply can listen without being divided. When we listen to ourselves or to another without being divided, we are more available for what wants to resolve itself as love, as peace. We are more open to sensing the movement of energies that may have given rise to what we are experiencing as conflict. When we're reactive and take sides within ourselves, we’re basically blind — we’re not really seeing clearly because we're not open to the undercurrents that brought about what appears to be the problem. And then it becomes a “ping pong” situation. 

We see this commonly in intimate relationships — when we are triggered, the trigger brings up a feeling that we don’t want to feel. It could be a sense of being abandoned or rejected and this is based on a past hurt from childhood. The reaction is to blame the other instead of staying present in our own felt-sense. But we are willing to soften and allow the feeling, it doesn’t turn into a battle. Softening our defense and attack system means there’s an open space in which we can communicate from a more authentic dimension … we can truly listen to ourselves and to each other, we can relate. This has nothing to do with “I'm right, you're wrong”. Neither has it anything to do with “I'm wrong, you're right” … just to keep a kind of peace. That isn't real peace, it’s more of a ceasfire. There's really no right or wrong. There is simply what is … the raw, naked, bare bones of what is here now. To really sit in this — without any strategy, without any defendedness, without any armoring — this is the deepest acceptance that surrenders the mind to the heart. This ends the war with reality and allows love to inform us.

When we have discovered the source of peace within ourselves — as the recognition and embodiment of the One Being-ness — then all cultural, religious, ideological, and geographical identities fall apart. And then there is the possibility of true peace, the kind of peace that has a real impact on our relationship to ourselves, to each other, and to the wider context of the world and to all beings … including the trees, the flowers, the birds, and the sky. It’s a fundamental shift in how we see things and it changes everything.

Each of us is responsible for peace. It starts within.