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yourself from a constantly active mind and from demanding emotions,
you can find some peace. With practice, you can get better at
withdrawing from the stress (while becoming an even keener
observer). Several other steps will help you do this.
STEP TWO: Meditation will also help you detach yourself from
the mind. Periods of relaxation will help.
Meditation is very effective in quieting the mind (see method #5).
This is good training for centering.
STEP THREE: Use determinism to increase your acceptance of
what is happening (see method #3 and chapter 14).
By understanding that there are causes for everything that
happens, we can start to focus more on observing the true causes and
less on some emotional reaction, such as "ain't it awful," "that should
never have happened," etc. We can relax because we know the
outcome was lawful (unless we witnessed a miracle).
As Mikulas (1983) points out, this accepting attitude gives us a
certain freedom--a toleration of whatever happens. We may, of
course, have a preference about what happens, and if the desired
behavior occurs, we are happy, but if something else happens, we can
be equally happy, because we accept reality (laws) and we learned
some important information about the laws of behavior. The freedom
from being right or winning and just focusing on observing and
learning is a great relief.
STEP FOUR: Give up trying to control everything, loosen up.
As it is said in Desiderata, whether you understand it or not, the
world is unfolding as it should. Eastern philosophies advocate
acceptance or "going with the flow of the river." Going upstream is
very hard and probably isn't the right direction anyway. Focus on
learning to control your own life within a little bubble, don't worry
much about changing the course of great rivers.
STEP FIVE: With practice you can learn to have a detached,
calm, accepting attitude. That is peace of mind.
Peace of mind includes more than inner calm, it is accepting
oneself, others, and the world. It is being sensitive to being off center,
i.e. things beginning to go wrong, and doing something about the
problems right away. It is a wonderful mental state, but no one can
achieve it all the time.
Time involved
These changes require major revisions in the way we think, that
will take a lot of time and effort.
