You cannot force peace on yourself. Once we start making an effort to be peaceful we are facing an uphill battle. “Battle”, being the appropriate word; because effort creates strain (a battle). The best result we can hope for will be agitation disguised as peace. In other words it will be temporary. Trying to force the mind to be still in meditation is a non-starter. Peace can only be experienced through understanding. By devoting more time to sitting in the silence and simply allowing ourselves to be, we become more attuned with our authentic Self. Thoughts are bound to arise when we sit in the silence, but don’t try to force them to go away; just allow them to flow by.

With a bit of practice we can all find that silent garden of the soul. This helps to increase our understanding of who we are; our true nature. Once we find that “peace that passes all understanding”, we realise that there was no need to go looking for it; it was there all the time. It was just a case of not being able to see it because we have been conditioned to be the “agitated self”, and not who we really are.