Question: How can we find lasting peace?
Sri Chinmoy: My first poem in English runs thus: “A sea of peace and joy and light/Beyond my reach I know.” (1) Almost every aspirant feels at the dawn of his spiritual life that peace is beyond his reach. The mind is always bothering us. The mind is constantly taking us from one place to another, from one object to another in the inner world and in the outer world. But a day comes when we feel in our inner life that there can be nothing worth achieving but peace.
It is peace that operates in the inner world and the outer world in the life of an aspirant. Eventually a day comes when he cannot separate himself from peace. Now he is crying for peace. He does not have peace here, there or anywhere. But as the mounting flame of aspiration within him gets the opportunity to reach the highest, the inner peace starts functioning most intensely and most powerfully in him. Then one day he notices that he abides in the sea of peace; he can never be separated from peace. His existence, inner and outer, is flooded with peace. For that experience, what we need is aspiration. Aspiration is the key.
Excerpt from Perfection And Transcendence by Sri Chinmoy
(1) The Golden Flute by Sri Chinmoy
Related
- Talk on Inner Peace by Sri Chinmoy
- Article – Seven Steps to Inner Peace at Sri Chinmoy Inspiration