Inner Peace

The premise of inner peace is, as the precursor to Transcendentalism Channing preached, there can be no peace without but through peace within. With few if any exceptions, corporeal, sanctuarial and socio­economic peaces are as essential for individuals to be internally at peace as for societies, just as peace within societies is essential for peace between them.

Unconditional acceptance and encouragement exponentially increases the probability of success once a choice for inner peace is made or changed, and compulsory choices not only invalidate the meaning of choice but the peace towards which choices are geared.

Quietude and Plenitude

Tranquility, calmness and stillness have long been and still are character­istics strongly associated with inner peace, as well as with the natural, social and collective states conducive to it. For example, the inner peace of Daoist inaction in wu-wei lies in the free-flow of inward and outward energy of which an individual can be a medium or impediment. Even samurai had their tearoom safe havens where weapons reminiscent of their livelihood were not allowed. Many share the desire for a few fleet­ing moments of quietude in the midst of everyday life’s hustle and bustle; those systematically denied usually find peace difficult to attain. Eremite Christian monks and Shugendo practitioners made these fleeting moments ways of life, but may not have been able to without a degree of plenitude, a sense of completeness corporeal or otherwise.

Recognition and Respect

Mesopotamian issuance of coins by states was a way to non-violently assert their fiscal or political independence, cylinder seals cemented rela­tionships between individuals and groups, and their value depended on recognition and respect. Medieval states were and modern states are rec­ognized by one another through treaties and gain respect through mutu­ally beneficial trade and/or protective alliances. Mohammed had a reputation for justice and honesty which allowed him to improve plights of the first Muslims. Trade unions were recognized by their states before they became effective collective bargaining bodies, as which they gained respect they lacked as militant bodies before. Individually, recognition and respect successively derive from or against family, community, edu­cation, professions, states, the media, and religious, regional and world bodies, without which the most successful peacemakers in world history could not have achieved what they did. The flipside: militants and terror­ists gain recognition the same way but at others’ expense, thereby losing the respect of their enemies while gaining that of their backers, creating a precarious asymmetry that makes (re)conciliation difficult, let alone peace. Whom to recognize and how, whom to respect and for what are central questions to world peace depending entirely on what point of view is taken and what is at stake.

Spiritual and Intellectual Attainment

The most elusive and yet most sought-after components of inner peace are probably spiritual and intellectual attainment. Religious imperatives of peace are related to but distinguished from spiritual imperatives. The former organize, systemize and make prescriptions of the latter only after the latter have been proven. The belief in karma as individual pursuits for peace made more achievable in social conditions insofar as the social reflects the prevalence of the individual rested on reincarnative peace, the idea that our peace or its absence in this life will continue in the next, shared by major monotheisms. The Buddhist Eightfold Path and Islamic Five Pillars are both passages to peace and its spiritual qua behavioral sup­ports. Intellectuals such as Russell, Pauling and Forsberg were all eminent in their fields before becoming peacemakers, and peace writers through­out the ages have been able to articulate new ideas and principles inasmuch as they are versed in those of the past and present. This is not to say that everyone must have a PhD or be saintly for world peace to be actualized, but instead to suggest that striving for and reaching the spiritual and intel­lectual attainment within one’s grasp is a stepping stone thereto more easily actualizable once the Pyramid’s previous levels and items are met.