Achieving Peace

Would you agree with this? “I wake up every morning to fight the same demons that had left me so tired the night before." This was my voice in my early adulthood. I felt tired most times, just dealing with my life. Confusion, worry, sadness, disappointments, pain, betrayal, loneliness, fear, and hopelessness at times. How did I manage it all? I felt that I was always learning. Everyone around me all seems to have their shit together. They confidently made decisions and knew where they were going in their lives.

I was timid in my spirit… careful not to let anyone see how afraid I was. How I thought about myself was in constant fluctuation. Not stable by no means in my emotions. But you could not tell that by talking to me or being around me. I found my self-image swayed with every comment, observation, hateful remark that anyone spoke to me directly or not. Even from people, I did not know. I learned to disguise my true self very well. What am I doing? Can they see my real me? I would question myself over and over. The scenario would take up space and time and more space in my thoughts. I would go to bed tired and wake up with the same thoughts… AGAIN!!

However, one climatic evening, driving home from work, after having another stressful day of dealing with inconsiderate management, volatile co-workers, and reaching home to encounter another sibling’s cruel accusation and my parent’s inability to set boundaries in our family dynamics, I exploded. But if you know me, at that time, I was so accustomed to controlling my outward burst. You would not have known anything was different. So, on the outside, I was calm. However, on the inside, the atomic bomb had just gone off. I was in pain, from the tips of my hair to the nails on my toes.

That night my pillow was soaked with my tears of how little control I had of my inner world. I cried out… I NEED PEACE! It was in the wee hour of the morning that the words… Peace, be still, came to me. The bible recants a story of Jesus and his disciples;

There was a great storm of wind, as waves beat into the ship. Jesus was in the stern of the ship sleeping when the disciple woke him and said, ‘Master do you not care that we are about to die?’ (Mark 4:38) Jesus woke and rebuke the wind and said to the sea, 'Peace be still.' And the wind ceased and there was a great calm. (4:39) And Jesus said to them, “Why are you so fearful? How is it that you have no faith?” (4:40) And the disciples were fearful and asked, “Who is this man, that even the wind and sea obey him?” (4:41)

I remember that story in the wee hours of the morning as I wipe my tear-soaked face. I needed to tell my inner self - Peace be still! I wanted peace in my mind, peace in my emotions, peace in my expectations, peace in my body, peace in my relationships, peace in my work, peace in my decision making, peace in my thoughts. I realize at that moment that I did not have peace anywhere in my life. I was no longer a child, depending on a parent to make decisions about what I should do or say or be. I was the controller of me. And the adult me needed to put away childhood me to find peace.

Recognizing this need of desperately seeking me. I permitted myself to start my healing with peace. And over the weeks, months, years, and now, even decades of my life, I search for peace, I create peace, I build peace, and I give peace. I learned how to release my past experiences and trust that everything is happening for my greater good. I learned to acknowledge my imperfections and my God-given gifts - of me. I learned how to allow the perspectives of others to deepen my understanding of them, not me, and to love them through it. And I learn how to forgive myself for what I did not know. Peace.

We are all in need of peace. Wisdom from Oswald Chambers [ https://utmost.org/am-i-carnally-minded/ ] says…

“We are not fundamentally free; external circumstances are not in our hands, they are in God’s hands, the one thing in which we are free is in our relationship to God. We are not responsible for the circumstances we are in, but we are responsible for the way we allow those circumstances to affect us; we can either allow them to get on top of us, or we can allow them to transform us into what God wants us to be. “

I know you too, are searching for that peace. In this overwhelming, unprecedented time that we are living today, it certainly does not help how we are to gain and maintain that peace. But I can tell you that you can. I see you. Yes, YOU CAN!! And here I know that even if you have to crawl an inch at a time, you can find the calm, still peace that you need. So, all the pain, confusion, worry, hate, loneliness, and suffocation that you are going through, I can tell you that there is hope. There is grace. And just like how I have crawled, and at some moments, on my belly, the wisdom to peace that I have gathered over decades of an unbalanced life, I want to share all this with you. I want to share the wisdom that encourages your soul, which encourages your spirit and provides you with the inspiration that WILL lead you to a more peaceful and more abundant life. And I want you to have that life NOW! Not later, not tomorrow, but NOW! You may be in the valley of your life, you may be living in the overwhelming, but I promise you, that is not your home. There is more for you. Our creator said so. And He declared us as creators. So, let’s claim our God-given right to peace.

So now, I invite you to connect with me on my brand-new YouTube channel called ACHIEVING PEACE. Where you will find encouragement, inspiration, wisdom, family, love, and grace to support your life to freedom with peace. Every week, new videos of inspired wisdom will be shared. There will be guest wisdom movers and shakers to impart with you their road to peace and more. I invite you to become a subscriber and ring the bell for notification of weekly video updates. This is a place for you to go to, to be encouraged, and eventually learn to encourage yourself, to build a solid foundation to your inner world and command it – “Peace be still”.