The Peace We Keep Chasing

Peace does not arrive later—it begins when we stop bargaining with the future.

On a summer solstice walk, I reflect on the search for peace and the surprising discomfort that can come when old striving begins to collapse. This episode explores ego gratification, mindset, yearning, and the belief that peace will arrive after the next accomplishment, relationship, or financial milestone. A walk about choosing peace now, rather than waiting for the breeze to come later.

Walk with me.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Hello. Welcome to Embody Wisdom. Walking a talk, Dr. Brook. Bye from my neighborhood. Kenny. Very beautiful. It's a great day. It's always nice like when the humidity breaks and you have that breeze. You can hear that breeze. And I just got myself a new microphone. It's not being used today, but finally.

SPEAKER_00 0:41

So the sound quality will be better. Uh soon. As soon as I can get that up and running.

SPEAKER_01 0:51

So oh, hi buddy. So in this.

unknown 0:57

Oh.

SPEAKER_01 1:00

Don't come too close. Good morning. So so the dog was coming very close. I got very worried because the dog was very com coming very close to the end of the edge of his yard. And um, you know, like with the where the electric fence, and it's like I just didn't want him to get shocked, or I was like, be like, no, don't come pet me. And I want to pet you, but don't, yeah, don't come too close because then you're gonna get shocked. Well, anyway, I'm already starting a little different than usual this morning. Um, which is how I felt when I came out the door. Well, anyway, back to the beauty of the breeze. Um, I was thinking about how it reminds me how the weather can, you know, how it can trigger these memories. Whenever I feel that breeze like that, I think about um just think about summer camp for some reason. Like I think it's how the mornings used to feel in July in the mountains. And it sort of brings this feeling to me of comfort. So it's it's interesting how our bodies remember how much we're so I was I was thinking today about the state of peace. And how different I think about that concept today than I did um years ago. I feel like I for years and years and years I was in striving to find this peace. And I've been working really hard to find it in myself, and for others too. I guess that's sort of what I'm in the business of because I truly think peace is the highest form of contentment. And I think that what wrecks what messes with our peace is actually our minds. Um someone sent me earlier this week a quote um about basically that most suff suffering happens in our imagination, which is I will say is definitely true of me. And I would say this inevitably true if you live in a space that you're feel comfortable and that you're physically safe in. So the rest of it happens in a in our minds. So morning, hi. So all that being said, I expected it like to feel like an accomplishment. Like I'm gonna find this level ground and it's gonna feel stable. That peacefulness is gonna be like this breeze. You know, it's gonna be like this breeze. But and I did find camp to be a peaceful space, right? But the feeling of peace, I don't know, maybe that I expected to feel it doesn't feel like the breeze, really. It feels more complicated than the breeze. Because if I wasn't peaceful before, and I I yearn for peace, then something has to drastically change in my psyche for me to find that peace. And that change is very unsettling. So I don't know where I thought as I and also strive for peace. You know, how peaceful is that? It's almost like, it's almost like you might just want to quit that whole job because that's probably not the right direction. Working hard to find something. This is probably like working less hard to find something, so you have to. I think it's like the effortless effort situation, so you have to work less hard, you have to work harder to work less hard. That's what this feels like. Because at the basis of it, there's no like congratulatory response that you have found this level playing ground. It's more like the stuff you thought would bring you peace, which created more chaos. Right? This is this is this is like these things in life. So it's like if I I'll give you an example. It's sort of like I will find more peace when I'm making this much money. I will find more peace when I finish this creative project. I will find more peace when, you know, it's this again, it's that um that idea that I'll be happy when, you know. It never works. This is the irony, it just doesn't work ever. And yet we keep doing it. Because the other option is to collapse our ego gratification around the idea that we're gonna get this cool breeze in the morning because we s because we did something. And it's like, you see, like this, it's it's incongruous. What does one thing have to do with the other? It's not like I'm gonna wake up in the morning and the weather's gonna be dependent on it it's not like I'm gonna wake up in the morning and the weather, the breeze is dependent on the action I did or didn't take the day before. I mean, that's like what we're saying, that's like what that is. This is a really good analogy. Glad it presents itself because what what I realize in my more peaceful state is I realize these things were not connected. That that gratification isn't coming from that. Because I thought the ego gratification would be would be what would bring me peace. And in this case, the ego gratification just means when I accomplish this, I'm assuming I'm gonna get that. And in this case, it's a feeling. I'm gonna feel secure. I'm gonna feel secure. Um, but I don't. But I'm but I don't now, so why when I get that, am I gonna feel secure then? It really doesn't make any sense. Because if I don't feel it now, I'm not gonna feel dead. Because the thing that that I'm producing from within me is this idea over and over again. You see how like that's what's creating the chaos. That's what is creating the chaos. So if I collapse that idea, I collapse the idea that I have to do something to get this. I'm gonna collapse the idea that this feeling is gonna be found in an accomplishment. And I'm just gonna be sitting here right now. And it's this is especially if things are tumultuous outside of you. I also think this is very notable. So what I mean by that is it's sort of like, oh, when this ends, let's even put that in. When this ends, oh my god, things are gonna feel, you know, better. And they might. They might, but this other thing, this one day I'm gonna get this, and that's still gonna go on. So then that's let's layered on top. If that's already a mechanic for you, I just I hear this a lot. I don't, it's just not a mechanic for me. I hear this a lot. About the striving for something, waiting for something, then that's gonna make me feel better. And then I can then I'm gonna be able to like relax. Then I'm gonna be able to have this peace. Okay, so but when that collapse happens, when you go, wait, wait, I could sit into this myself. I can change my mind about this. Because people say about their mindsets, they'll be like, well, I don't know. I've been doing that for 55 years, or I've been doing that for 75 years. I don't know, like am I am I really, really gonna change that? You can't change my mindset. Uh yeah, you can. You can if you realize that your mind's setting your you up for chaos, not peace, and that's because you know that, because you keep creating that. So, in order for that to change, if you're looking for a different space to rest in, a different way to define things, because nothing has meaning until we give it meaning. So if it's sort of like this idea, well, um, I'm not making money right now, so all the projects I'm doing, they don't count. Right? You see, this is a very that's not peaceful. And where do you get the idea? Oh, the projects only count if they're making money. Well, where's that idea coming from? That's not peaceful, but this is interesting. When that neutralizes, I don't know, I expect it to be like samadhi. I don't know if you guys know samadhi. It's just like, or like it's if it's gonna feel like uh um Yoga Nidra. And these are like these states of consciousness, you know, we see the yogis, you see, you see these, you know, meditators, and they're like sleeping but and also awake.

unknown 11:54

Right?

SPEAKER_01 11:55

I'm gonna be that. You know, that's what this is gonna look like. Um, well sorry, I got interrupted. So now put the pieces back together. Sorry. Um, okay, so if if we're gonna collapse our realities and we can go inside and we can find that space, we have to collapse into that space, that neutrality. And in order to do that, we have to give up whatever thought we we're having. We have to give up that idea, and that idea, well, that's been running a long time, probably helped us cope with things, like really yucky feelings growing up. So then we go, okay, okay, this feels really yucky, but if I do this, then maybe I'll get the breeze. If I do this, then maybe I'll get the breeze. If I do when I grow up and I can do things on my own, it won't feel like this anymore. Right? Well, that's a habit. And what I what's under that habit, it's turmoil. So, but not memories of turmoil, really, right? Because the coping mechanism is not going on today because you need it necessarily, it's going on because we don't sit into the fact these things are not true. It's almost like giving up like a hope about something that you could get that's gonna take away these experiences. Now, the problem with the psyche, or it's not a problem, but the way that the psyche represses things that can't be coped with at an earlier time, and it represents it for review. And and it's like this is complicated, and everybody just wants, I don't know, you just everyone wants this simple human experience, and it's just not simple. I mean, if we think about this, our minds are designed to do this, and everybody's mad about that, or at least I am. Because I don't want to have to change my mindset, I don't want to have to do the work to do that, and that's when people are all stompy and like they don't have to change, why do I have to change? You know, like people say that about people in their life, difficult people. Well, they didn't change, but well, um, you change because you're aggravated with the way you're operating. That is why you change. You don't change because of that. So the change that you want for you is for yourself. Don't I don't know, don't uh don't trick yourself into thinking it's any any different. So because the other thing is, is that yearning to find the thing that's gonna lead to the breeze that you can't control, right? Because you're not that's not what's created, they're not really associated. You could also misstep. So it would be like I don't know, the idea money always comes up with this for me. I feel like if I have more money, the breeze is gonna come. So let's say I might do things to promote more money making, not illegal things or anything like that, just make decisions, and this is when people might go into business too quickly, like you know, it looks really shiny, but they don't really think through the business deal. Like in the end, they're you know, gonna be giving too much of something away. It's kind of like that, like you go in you go after something for a quick fix because it's saying you could get successful sooner. Um, and but you're not really looking at the real bearings of that because it's like a get-rich quick scheme, you know, that type of thing. And and really, you know, building things, it's laborious. So if you know that building something's laborious, but in your mind, you tell yourself, oh, this should be happening more quickly for me. I need the breeze, or I need to make, I just have to keep making this yucky feely going away, which isn't even happening anymore. But it's underneath because what happens is when you stop these behaviors, whatever they are, the yearning, the thought processes, the mindsets, you sit back into the reality that that this this can't be fixed, whatever this is, that that feeling, it can't be fixed. But this is the funny part, you're not even experiencing it anymore. Most likely, you could be, and I actually apologize for those that might still be in these type of repetitive relationships where you're still in it. And if you're listening to this and you're still in something like that, then this is the gateway out. Because the because you don't have to do it anymore. Okay, because you're an adult. So whether whether you're you're playing it out, living it out, any of it, it this this applies, it doesn't matter. Because little legs, kids have no power, they often cannot do anything to change their circumstances, except for make promises to themselves about how they might manage their circumstances in the future. And if you're listening to this now, pretty much you've kept that promise to yourself because just the nature of listening to um what I talk about uh loosens loosens uh these mechanisms because it's giving you another way to think, giving you a different mindset. So, in that that's just brave. And the reason why changing mindset, which now I'm kind of even understanding better, is so brave, is because underneath it, there's your ego gratification collapses, and we're all gonna have egos. I'm not even I don't really mean to make an ego like a negative thing, and quick lesson on the ego, at least in Freud's uh Freud's world, for the the system that Freud's um notable for creating. There's a superego, the ego and the id. The superego is society's rules, just the in the most basic in your family's rules, morals, things like that. The id is the needs, wants, the primal, uh desires, you know, the animal instinct stuff, sex and aggression. And the ego balances these two things. It takes all that raw feeling and all the rules, and it translates and it tries to help you find a space. And it and the ego is also present, that idea is also it's also present in ancient philosophies, in yoga philosophy as well. So it's there's a space for it, and I think that just by the way, Freud pulled these ideas from those philosophies. So it's it's here, we're the ego's here to stay. We're not getting rid of the ego. There's all these like the ego edge god out, you know. In other words, like the ego's getting in your way of being your true self. Um, okay, yeah, yes, because the ego's the thing that says when you get this, this is gonna go well for you. That's the ego. Telling you that. Because it's trying to manage the icky-yucky feelings, the anger in your teenage years that didn't get expressed with what your parents said you had to be to be loved, what society said you had to be loved. Okay, so this is where these mechanics come from coping, whatever. So if we give them up, where do we find ourselves? We give up, we change the mindset, and the new mindset is that's interesting. The new mindset. A peaceful mind, this is spontaneous, a peaceful mind results from recognizing the yearnings for tomorrow. The tomorrow that is never coming. Rather than focusing. On and hope the wind is not interrupting too much of what I'm saying this morning. Rather than just focusing on the breeze. And again, this brings up what I was talking about last week about where you put your attention or the week before. More, you know, smothered through. So when you find yourself in the new space that you thought was going to be like the spring-summer breeze, and it actually feels like uh the the the bottom's falling out from underneath you because your identity is now like I won't say in crisis because this is choices we're making, because we're like, I don't like my identity being based on these three uh rules, these three rules, these three, you know, I'm gonna say these three expectations. I don't I don't want that. I want peace. And peace comes with, okay, you don't want that. You want to replace that with the expectations of compassion or um present moment conscious. You know, it's like, what do I give myself a reward for? Because sometimes the reward needs to come in, I choose peace. So I'm not gonna choose that get rich quick scheme. I'm not gonna choose to call that person back. I'm not gonna choose that because that that um that behavior. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna choose to believe anymore that that the breeze is coming if I do this. I'm not gonna choose that anymore. Well, what are you gonna choose instead? Right? And that's where things start to feel like that means that today is what you got. Today. And today will become tomorrow. Right? So what do you do today so that tomorrow can be peaceful? You create peace today. So it's what you have today, right now, that you need to focus on. It's what you're thinking today, right now, that you need to focus on. Not a day in the future that the breeze might blow in. And what you got today is what you got. And then if that's not working for you, you can change it right now. That doesn't mean you don't need help help outside counsel, doesn't mean that. Because this is very confusing what I'm talking about. But everybody wants it, they claim they want it, but what if I say this like you have to renegotiate with your ego to get that? And that's gonna feel pretty icky because your ego, you know, that part of your mind sense uh some of these things, uh, buried them in the, you know. So sometimes I'm like tell people, I'm like, we gotta go look for where the bodies are buried, you know, bury them in the back of your mind. I was like, yeah, you don't need to know this. No. So instead it just comes up because you're going, oh, wait. I promised myself I was never gonna think money, a man, an accomplishment, my children's accomplishments, uh, someone like inviting me somewhere. I promised myself I wouldn't use that as the guide of whether or not I'm good enough. I promise myself that. But wait, that's what I'm doing. That's what I'm doing right now. But I prom- Oh. Oh. Oh, now I remember what that felt like. Wait, I feel like that every day. I wait, I feel like that now. I don't like the way this feels. It's not peaceful. And then I get then it's this is why we also feel insecure. Not only because of that insecure experience, but we feel insecure because if we're going to let this guide us, we are going to misstep. And what I mean by misstep is we're not gonna be aligned with what brings us peace in this context. Because we're gonna be aligned with what we said we're gonna do in the future to get peace. It's strange. But let me tell you something, when when you get that feeling, you get the feeling of like um, this is the truth of where I find myself, and it will be okay. It's life, and I will find resources so I'm okay. No matter what, I'll figure it out. And I figured it out before, I'll figure it out again. Okay, so I hope uh this wasn't too convoluted, this major download. Hope you enjoyed. I enjoyed offering it. And thanks for being here again with me this week. Uh we have the yes, happy summer solstice to everybody. And uh walk with me again soon. Thanks.