After all, what is peace? A passive state in which you prefer to put your problems aside, or a feeling that is hard to find these days?

The BBC presents some ideas about peace of mind and suggests ways to find it if we’ve lost it.

Stoic calm

“Stay calm and collected, no matter what life brings you,” advised the Roman philosopher Marcus Aurelius.
Sounds easier said than done, one might say. But in fact, Aurelius knew how to easily find peace.

Aurelius’ famous Meditations, according to John Sellars, author and reader at Royal Holloway University of London, is about how to deal with your day-to-day worries and anxieties.

In particular, as emperor of Rome, Aurelius faced enormous pressure, but, as Sellars says, “he often reminded himself how short his life was compared to the immensity of time and how small it was compared to the entire universe.

Aurelius also constantly reminded himself that “any disappointment or negative feelings he may experience are ultimately the product of his own judgments or interpretations of situations, and therefore things are subject to change.

But is it really that important to find peace?

As Aurelius writes in the Meditations: “A man with a calm mind has strength.”

“Peace is necessary for a good and happy life. This is because an anxious person will not be able to make logical, rational decisions. For example, a person who is overwhelmed by violent emotions literally cannot think clearly. He is possessed and can act impulsively or violently. To make the right decisions, we need a calm state of mind,” explains Sellars.

After all, as the philosopher Epictetus points out: “When we are disappointed, angry or unhappy, we never place responsibility on anyone but ourselves.”

Music, art, Japanese poetry

A well-known tactic to calm someone down is music.

Electronic, garage and house music has been a form of escapism for decades, originally developed by marginalized social groups and then spreading everywhere. However, the sounds that soothe someone are purely a matter of personal taste.

You can find peace in the visual arts. It is also widely believed that the traditional form of Japanese poetry, haiku, which consists of 17 syllables in three lines, has a calming effect on the reader. The structure of the haiku follows a strict number of syllables and encourages the poet to focus on one image or moment, which in itself has a meditative effect. The use of images of nature in haiku also evokes a sense of calm and peace. The brevity and simplicity of a haiku allows the reader to ponder and consider the meaning and imagery without feeling overwhelmed by too many ideas.

Find your flow

In any case, calmness is viewed with suspicion by some, seeing in it a state of passivity or, even worse, a sociopathic detachment.

But calmness need not be equated with passivity or “passivity”.

When we are absorbed in what we love—music, gardening, painting, knitting, writing, whatever—we can enter a state of calm that is almost like a trance.

As the author Mitsuhashi states in his book on ikigai, immersing ourselves in nature or any particular activity forces us to focus on what is in front of us, freeing our mind from other things and allowing us to find the peace we seek.

Finally, author Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi argues that what really makes us feel calm, peaceful, and happy is having a good attitude towards ourselves. He calls this state “flow”. As he points out, each of us finds our flow, and therefore our peace, in a different way.

Source: BBC