August 30, 1988
God blesses your lives and enfolds your souls with the comforting warmth of God’s love.
There is more that we would like to share with you concerning the matter of balance in life and the implications of such balance in the matters of peace, both individual and corporate. We have spoken of the balance found in nature, but we would like to focus your attention on the elements of balance found from within.
In a physical sense your physical bodies are constantly seeking a state of balance. It is this balance which results in health. Without that kind of balance, illness prevails. To achieve physical balance one must always keep in mind the influence of the emotions upon that balance. If your emotions are filled with torment and anger, for example, the physical balance which is necessary becomes upset, for as you know the mind controls much of the body. Your emotional state directly affects your physical state.
To achieve an inner peace, you must be emotionally at peace, providing an environment for the peace which comes from a physical balance. The interrelationship between the mind and the body is inseparable. One cannot pray for physical health while being torn apart emotionally. Balance in both spheres must be achieved in order to attain balance of the whole.
It is, of course, possible to be generally emotionally balanced and yet suffer the consequences of physical tension. When one achieves a kind of emotional equilibrium, one is more able to assist the physical side of life. Being in balance or at peace physically does not automatically provide an emotional stability. It is the emotions which when stable are able to affect the physical peace. Too often humans worry about the physical state of health while ignoring the emotional state. It is most important first of all to deal with the emotions in order to be prepared to meet the physical needs. When you are at peace emotionally, you are stabilized.
There are those whom you have met who are emotionally at peace although they suffer from numerous physical ailments, and you marvel at their ability to cope, their ability to proceed forward. It is not that they ignore physical difficulties, but rather that they emotionally transcend them. When one is emotionally tormented, the physical stability deteriorates. If one has achieved a kind of emotional stability and peace, then it is able to have a positive effect on the physical condition. Both the mind and the body need to be coordinated to experience true peace, but there is a hierarchy here which describes the greatest importance to be placed upon this emotional stability.
When you pray for peace, you also pray for that emotional strength which then allows you to deal with whatever comes your way. When you pray on behalf of another who suffers from a particular ailment, more important than just praying that the ailment disappear is the need for praying for emotional strength, because it is that strength which helps place the suffering in perspective and provides an environment suitable for physical recovery, if that is what is ultimately best.
The issue of balance therefore involves both the world outside the individual and the world which is the individual, namely the emotional and physical world of the person. It is really very simple when seen this way. But far too often when praying for peace, human beings pray for only one dimension of peace, and then conclude that such peace has not been received and thereby the prayer has not been answered.
Peace is a broad term. It has many implications and applications. What is important for you is a recognition of the breadth of application that belongs to the state of peace which you all seek at various times in your lives. Peace in the world is even more an emotional issue than a military one, for if peace were emotionally secure, there would be no need for military enforcement of an arbitrarily chosen characteristic of peace. You pray for peace in the world for an end to strife, for a coming to terms of disparate forces and influences. But you must see that it first begins with the emotional, the intellectual, and then the physical, and finally the political realms.
It is the natural tendency of all souls to seek peace on all of these levels, for peace is the absence of conflict in each of these areas. It is the establishment of peace which helps provide a recognition of the beauty of life. To achieve inner peace, you must learn to be quiet. You must learn to listen to yourselves and thereby hear God. If you are honest with yourselves, you will recognize your true needs.
For everyone the order of such needs will differ. There is no real priority which is better than another. It is only a set of priorities which are more appropriate to one than to another. The matter of appropriateness changes from individual to individual and from time to time for the same individual. But for you to proceed through life constructively, it is important that you periodically reassess what you value as essential in your lives—not what someone else imposes, but a recognition of where you are at a given moment. There is no competition here. It is merely an acknowledgment of what your needs are and how best to meet them. It is through such contemplation that peace is ultimately reached.
The peace which you feel following such gatherings as this can be very real and is on occasion extremely intense. At times it is not really fully achieved, for underneath the desire for a clearer perspective of God flows an undercurrent of impatience, a desire to get on with other things. Such desires run counter to the attainment of real peace.
Each of you has a means of reaching the peace you seek, particularly because of your awareness of us within your lives. We ask that you recognize the value of your guides. Acknowledge their constant presence, and seek their loving guidance. In so doing your lives will fulfill the purposes for which they were designed, and you will at last find yourselves within the presence of God.
We transmit to you God’s blessings for lives enriched by a clearer sense of direction, by a peaceful return to your activities, and an eventual resumption of these gatherings. God’s peace is yours for the asking and for the accepting. Rejoice in that! God’s love is your love. God’s light may be yours.
Amen.