Making Peace with the Past Part 5
December 3, 2024
Making Peace with the Past Part 5
When Jesus said,” Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the children of God” he blessed all peacemaking—even the peace we make within our souls. So, making peace with ourselves furthers the cause of peacemaking and, at the same time, God affirms us God’s children.
We have all experienced inner turmoil and conflict, which upsets our minds, emotions, and bodies. If we think about it, our unhealthy egos compensate for inner turmoil by doing anything that soothes, distracts, or anesthetizes us to the discomfort. In extreme compensation, we can become unsettled, self-abasing, indignant, neurotic, and even split off from ourselves, which is known as psychosis.
Author of the seminal work, The Divided Self (1960), psychiatrist R. D. Laing contends that mental illness is understandable in that such conditions as psychosis (the loss of orientation to reality) are not primarily a medical condition but the result of inner conflict. He said that although medicines and other therapies treat the condition, its root cause is that the person is divided against themself. Laing maintained that the inner conflict is between our genuine private identity and the false self we present to the world. Ahead of his time, Laing advocated the directed and controlled use of hallucinogens and cannabis for the treatment of mental conditions. He held that under such altered mental states we can experience life without the false self and thereby create more inner unity.
Spiritual teachers A. H. Almaas and Sandra Maitri would agree with Laing that the most significant conflict is between our ego and true nature. True nature is also referred to as our essence or true self. According to these teachers, the ego’s false self vies against our true nature and from this conflict come such ills as our repressions, avoidances, passions, and inner critics.
Peace-making in the soul consists of unifying our true and false selves. That may sound simple, but doing it is challenging. It requires consciousness of these two components and spiritual practices that facilitate the amalgamation of the two. The false self is not a naughty self—a side of us who deceives the world for nefarious purposes. Instead, the false self is a protective covering, much like a turtle’s shell. It protects us from all we would have to endure if we were known at the deepest levels of our being.
On the other hand, our true nature is our soul child—a spontaneous, non-guilt-ridden, innocent, and honest being who follows their bliss regardless of what others may think. Both components hold inestimable truths. Therefore, combining the best of both instead of setting them against one another enables us to claim our essential identities as children of God.
Spiritual practice:
Grant yourself compassion.
Relax the inner struggle between your false self and true nature.
Recognize that both parts of yourself are necessary.
Realize that all humans face the same fundamental struggle and forgive yourself for warring within yourself.
Make an intention to learn more about your true nature and your false self to prevent inner conflict and instead place your energies in establishing unity between the two components.
Self-inquiry: What about your true nature would be disapproved of by your false self, and why?
Dear God,
As a child of yours, I pray to make peace within my soul. Amen
