Christian animism. Thomas Aquinas

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What is your personal definition of a "peaceful mind"? What are some ways that you can achieve mental peace when everything seems chaotic?

Ahh, yes…the elusive quest for permanent mental peace, or santosha (contentment.) ‘Humans’ have devised & experimented with so many ways to achieve that:

- Material pursuits
- Romance & love
- Sense-gratification
- Accomplishment & legacy
- Escape through mind-altering substances
- Attempted “attitude-shifts” from ‘personal growth’ workshops
- Religious beliefs
- Spiritual paths

Why do none of these provide sustained mental peace when everything seems chaotic…or even when everything is already relatively peaceful?

Because “you” are there.
The “I” that thinks it was born and is going to die.
The “me”-mind, a machine that’s sole pursuit is survival, obtaining pleasure and avoiding pain.
The mentally-fabricated ‘self’ that insists it is a separate entity, separate from Peace and everything else.

This ‘secret’ of being at peace will remain thoroughly hidden as the as long as there is a “someone” looking for it.
You will never get this because “you” are there trying to get it, and, in the dream-of-separateness, that false “you’s” very nature is to feel separate and therefore, already disconnected, unfulfilled and scared for its survival.

When there is no one, automatically there is only Peace, Being.
The moment there is “someone,” thinking something is missing - when in fact This is all The Beloved, whole, complete and perfect just As It Is - the chaos & suffering of illusory separateness is quite inevitable.

The exquisite paradox: “You” cannot ‘cause’ dissolving into no-self, because “you” are there trying to cause it.:-)

One day, “you” may be walking down the road (or any other acton,) and It may suddenly, radically, unexpectedly happen that there isn’t anyone that it’s happening to. Just What Is.

Until then, “you’ can (and probably will) try any of the above listed methods to attain lasting peace, and see what you get-don’t get. “You” will likely try several of them simultaneously.\

And that’s fine. That’s simply Being’s apparent dream-of-separateness. Enjoy it all…unconditionally!

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