That Elusive World Peace . . . Found !

Two thousand years after the birth of the Prince of Peace, we are still searching for peace . It seems that we still do not yet understand the prescription for peace . We continue to search through the logical avenues such as the League of Nations and the United Nations. But evidently the answer is not there. Maybe the answer is somewhere else.
Long ago I read a story about Shangri-La.
Shangri-La was a far away place, where trouble and worry were left far behind. A land where there was harmony and peace , and where men and women were almost immortal. Shangri-La was a fantasyland. In the novel Lost Horizon by James Hilton, it was a mystical, magical valley hidden away in the mountains of Tibet. It was a permanently happy and peaceful place where men and women slowly aged as the centuries passed. Shangri-La was a land of hope and promise. Its purpose was to be a haven when our sad world had consumed itself in destruction and chaos.
James Hilton created this fantasyland to compare with his experience, and our own experience today. All around him was the antithesis of Shangri-La. He saw wars and rumours of wars. He saw greed and dishonesty rewarded. He saw violence and outrage and man’s inhumanity to man. And as in Hilton’s day, as well as in our own time, we wonder if there is a Shangri-La that we can escape to. A place where there is harmony and peace. A place where there is hope for a better future.
The good news is that there is such a place. Not necessarily in the far flung mountains of Tibet, nor in the lush, luxuriant vegetation of Hawaii or the warm waters of the blue Caribbean, but right here within you and within me. The message that has come down through the centuries is as true now as it was then: “The water that I shall give him shall be in him, a well of water springing up into everlasting life.” The promise is that we can experience a peace, which passes all understanding. Despite all the turmoil and distress, we can experience a serenity and peace in our own personal Shangri-La. We can find this Shangri-la within ourselves. We start by learning how to control our thoughts. Most of us are controlled by our thoughts. Our mind then becomes like an unattended garden. Weeds of jealousy , anxiety and fear begin to grow, and in time take over and control our mind. We become lost and afraid. Listen to some of the sages of our own day :

Dalai Lama . . “ Peace starts within each one of us. When we have inner peace , we can be at peace with those around us. When our community is in a state of peace, it can share peace with neighbouring communities, and so on.”
Mohandas Gandhi . . . "As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world -- that is the myth of the 'atomic age' -- as in being able to remake ourselves."
Eleanor Roosevelt . . . . "Before we can make friends with anyone else, we must first make friends with ourselves."
Henry David Thoreau . . . . "What lies before us and what lies behind us are small matters compared to what lies within us. And when we bring what is within out into the world, miracles happen."
All these and many more have maintained that peace starts on the inside. We can make Laws and Proclamations, declare Just Societies, upgrade our Human Rights Constitutions which are good and right . . . . . but nothing happens until we begin to experience individual peace on the inside.
At this historic moment in time, as we stand on the threshold of our world in crisis bordering on catastrophe, the question we face is, “can we rise to the challenge?” The challenge of a shift in consciousness to a new consciousness of love, forgiveness and inner peace .

Organizations dedicated to this concept:
The Shift Movement: http://shiftmovement.com/protected/
Humanity’s Team: http://www.humanitysteam.org/
Global Coherance Initiative:http://www.glcoherence.org/

Excerpt from:
“Life One-0-One: Find your Purpose”
by Vince DaCosta

Website: www.lifeone0one.com
e-mail: vhdacosta@rogers.com
YouTube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZH0OmqyIyI

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