All conflict arises from misplaced desire

I've been wanting to share this passage from Conversations with God, Book 2 for a little while.  I think (well I find myself there anyway), it can be so easy to get caught up in the story so often. And whilst I think the story is all part of our human journey here, maybe dealing with the story is a part of it too, seeing beyond the story to the glory beneath, beyond and through it all. So I thought if it made sense to me, maybe it was worth sharing... It also made up a bit of bedtime story here this evening (after Judy Blume - I can't believe we're onto Judy Blume already!) so felt a particularly good time to share it with you...

'If you derive your life's greatest happiness from experiences obtainable only in the Outside World - the physical world outside of yourself - you will never want to give up an ounce of all that you've piled up, as a person and a nation, to make you happy.

And as long as those who 'have not' see their unhappiness tied to the lack of material things, they, too, will get caught in the trap. They will constantly want what you have got, and you will constantly refuse to share it.

That is why I said earlier that there is a way to truly eliminate war - and all experience of unrest and lack of peace. But this is a spiritual solution.

Ultimately, every geopolitical problem, just as ever personal problem, breaks down to a spiritual problem.

All of life is spiritual, and therefore all of life's problems are spiritually based - and spiritually solved.

Wars are created on your planet because somebody has something that somebody else wants. This is what causes someone to do something that somebody else does not want them to do.

All conflict arises from misplaced desire.

The only peace in all the world that is sustaining is Internal Peace.

Let each person find peace within. When you find peace within, you also find that you can do without.

This means simply that you no longer need the things of your outside world. 'Not needing' is a great freedom. It frees you, first, from fear: fear that there is something you won't have; fear that there is something you have that you will lose; and fear that without a certain thing, you won't be happy.

Secondly, 'not needing' frees you from anger. Anger is fear announced. When you have nothing to fear, you have nothing over which to be angry.

You are not angry when you don't get what you want, because your wanting it was simply a preference, not a necessity. You therefore have no fear associated with the possibility of not getting it. Hence, no anger.

You are not angry when you see others doing what you don't want them to do, becuase you don't need them to do or not do any particular thing. Hence, no anger.

You are not angry when someone is unkind, because you have no need for them to be kind. You have no anger when someone is unloving, because you have no need for them to love you. You have no anger when someone is cruel, or hurtful, or seeks to damage you, for you have no need for them to behave any other way, and you are clear that you cannot be damaged.

You do not even have anger should someone seek to take your life, because you do not fear death.

When fear is taken from you, all else can be taken from you and you will not be angry.

You know inwardly, intuitively, that everything you've created can be created again, or - more importantly - that it doesn't matter.

When you find Inner Peace, neither the presence nor the absence of any person, place or thing, condition, circumstance, or situation can be the Creator of your state of mind or the cause of your experience of being.

This does not mean that you reject all things of the body. Far from it. You experience being fully in your body and the delights of that, as you never have before.

Yet your involvement with things of the body will be voluntary, not mandatory. You will experience bodily sensations because you choose to, not becuase you are required to in order to feel happy or to justify sadness.

This one simple change - seeking and finding peace within - could, were it undertaken by everyone, end all wars, eliminate conflict, prevent injustice, and bring the world to everlasting peace.

There is no other formula necessary, or possible. World peace is a personal thing!

What is needed is not a change of circumstance, but a change of consciousness.'

Neale Donald Walsch