LIVE IN PEACE, HAPPINESS AND HARMONY

Peace and Happiness

Peace and happiness are free



Question

More than anything I desire to live among the mountains in peace and relative solitude, studying and becoming more whole. I feel that I'm trapped in a conundrum. To worsen matters, living in such a small town there are no teachers for the arts I wish to learn, and no masters to induct me. I also find myself feeling very lonely.

-- Matthew, USA

Answer

Peace and happinese are free, and can be found anywhere — on mountain tops as well as in busy towns.

Even when you have a teacher, the main part of the cultivation has to be done by you yourself. Masters do not simply materialize from thin air; you have to seek them, and when you are ready you will find them.

Many people can be lonely in a crowd, while the contented find happinese in their solitude. Seek beauty and joy in your daily life and in simple kind deeds no matter where you are.


Question

Is there a way to satisfy this yearning which rests inside me? Is there a way that I might live in peace and harmony, as I learn to sublimate this longing?

Answer

The yearning is often the necesary first step to serious cultivation. To live in peace and harmony is natural; war and disorder are unnatural.

There are many ways to peace and harmony, and different people because of different conditions will cultivate in different ways. For me, and for many people, practising the Shaolin arts is a wonderful way.



Reproduced from Questions 12 and 13 February 1999 Part 2 of the Selection of Questions and Answers

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