#111 – Inner truce

By Hélène Bourhis-Bois

By learning Full-Presence Meditation step-by-step and practising it regularly, it is possible to access a place of peace within ourselves with naturally more ease.  The conscious experience of perceiving the inner movement is accompanied by the feeling that preoccupations temporarily fade even though problems remain. 

Danis Bois questions how we can remain connected with this peace within and make it last, as it is quite common to observe that our mind spontaneously comes back to our daily concerns. Is it a problem ? Or is it a solution ? 

For this humanist philosopher, each problem carries within the invitation to look for a solution to adapt. And in that sense, our difficulty in preserving an inner climate of peace is an invitation to mobilize our ressources in order to preserve this inner peace.  There is no need to just look for the peace of heaven, as peace is much simpler. It’s feeling calm, tranquil, peaceful and identifying the moments when, in our connection with the external world, we come out of that state and we shift towards preoccupations, worries and reactions that are sometimes violent. And so preserving our inner climate of peace is dependent on a conscious choice and achieving this requires discipline and perseverance. 

Extracts of Danis Bois’ meditation on inner truce:

IThere isn’t a more peaceful retreat than silence inhabited by the presence of the movement that animates you within, your body, your head, your heart, all the parts of your body. 

There, you feel that you do not need to affirm yourself, nor to fade, in order to be, to exist. You are.

You are in a place of peace within yourself.

A velvet-like sensation of calm. 

The impression that everything is in its place. 

The sensation of being intensely present. 

A softness that does us good.

Feel how everything within you becomes peaceful, even though your external problems remain.

It is not the problem that is a problem. It’s it’s the way you perceive it, the space you give it. 

When we meditate, sometimes we are floaty. 

There are moments when the mind wants to come back to what it is familiar with and by familiar it may mean preoccupations. There is your tendency to judge yourself, and your tendency to judge others.

But here, everything is calm. Everything that usually disturbs you fades away from your negative way of looking at it.

And the dark sides disappear in that luminous connection with what you are living, of this beauty that is moving within you, that is also you.

Other people’s flaws become silent.

Bad judgements dissolve within your present state of benevolence. 

Here’s a moment of truce between you and your external life.

How is it possible not to marvel at this fragrance of life that flows within our body? 

How could you not marvel at the heart singing within you?

We are all looking for happiness. And deep within you, you know that this happiness, this bliss, has to be cultivated with the seeds of peace with which you can construct your happiness that comes from outside. 

Montaigne tells us that our fundamental happiness is to be alive.

It would be good if happiness depended as little as possible on external causes.

And to end this meditation, these words by the Dalai Lama: “We know that happiness is not easy, that it is difficult to find within ourself, but it is impossible to find it somewhere else.”

Danis Bois.