As we come to the end of 2023 I feel it has been a very full year. Some of it felt very peaceful and some of it certainly did not. How can we contribute to peace on earth? Does it feel like too big a task? Would you rather just get on with your life? Well to get on with your life, would you not rather be able to have an awareness of a sensation of peace within yourself, that you can access whenever you need to. It will certainly make life more enjoyable.
These were my special moments this year and you can see that they all contain the feelings of peace and love because that’s what joy is. I got to meet up with family in Vancover, that I haven’t seen for many, many years and it gave me a wonderful feeling of belonging and reiterates the importance of connection that we let slide because life gets too busy and distracting.
My beautiful daughter married her childhood sweetheart on a sunny day in June, that is filled with wonderful memories to treasure for life.
My son and his wife had a beautiful daughter, my first grandchild that melts my heart and fills me with an abundance of delight.
I completed another year long yoga Teacher Training Programme with Peter Appel and went to his Yoga Retreat in Majorca where I met some beautiful like minded people and we discussed yoga, movement and philosophy and all things that I enjoy and am curious about in life.
Inbetween I have felt anxiety, stress, and self doubt just like everyone else. Although how I cope with that may be different to you. I go to my meditation space and practice. I do a sadhana of various yoga techniques and with regular, disciplined practice find the peaceful, safe space within, that allows me to let go of the collective angst and worries of the world. I then have the realisation that the world is much bigger than me and my problems, and that if I trust in this intelligence within me, then I can feel peace. An amazing, spacious peace, full of possibilities. Filled with an abundance of love and joy.
Of course, this state of mind doesn’t last when you are carrying out you daily activities. The mind gets to work trying to pull you into it’s stories, dragging you down the path of negativity, if you let it. We are always being triggered by what’s going on around us. Having the tools to be conscious of that and to extract yourself from it as quickly as possible is important for mental health and your sense of peaceful wellbeing.
AS individuals peace on earth can only be achieved, when we choose to seek out the intelligent lifeforce energy that drives us and to trust it! The powers that be, who rule the world, are only determined to divide humanity more, it would seem hatred is the new trend. Although there is a portion of humanity who will refuse to stand by and watch people being killed on social media. What has happened to us that this is where we are at?
I feel despair for the world because I’m a sensitive person who can’t just pretend it’s not happening. Sure it’s hard to watch and listen to but on the other hand I’m not actually there. I do what I can, I do my Sadhana, I pray , I donate, I listen, I watch, I learn, I teach others. Here are two intentions you may wish to practice daily in 2024. If you start to say it daily the seed of the intention will flourish and grow until it becomes a true experience, this is where you have to trust in the intelligence of the lifeforce currently running through you. These statements are much more powerful than you may realise.
”I am creating peace within myself and the world around me.”
”I live a life of compasion towards myself and towards others.”
Or a more general one for everyone :
”May we all have access to the source creation within ourselves so that we may function from here as creators.”
Practice daily gratitude, be kind, be forgiving, be loving, it may not be easy but it’s up to us to do the work for the future generations. For your children and grandchildren, so they can live in better times, for peace on earth.
Here’s a beautiful quote by Walt Whitman (a poet) on the complexity of defining peace but yet our heart knows when we’ve found it. ” That hard as it is to find, impossible as it is to sustain, this thing which is so hard to define, is in spite of everything, one of our great values, a thing to ardently pursue.”
I wish you all a Christmas and New Year filled with an abundance of peace and love.
Janet xx
Check out – Celtic Calm; February yoga Wellness Retreat in the link below. Make plans for next year allow yourself to slow down for a weekend to find peace within and without. Develop strategies to find a more peaceful existence.