What Needs to Change in Order for Us to Be at Ease? with Noah Levine
July 26, 2021 What Needs to Change in Order for Us to Be at Ease?
I was wondering if you can reflect for a moment on the assumption that nothing in your life needs to change? Nothing outside of you needs to change for you to be happy, for you to be totally at ease, free from suffering.
Now I'm sure we could think of some examples of situations that do need to change, but let's just play the game of nothing outside of you needs to change and that everything you need in order to get free is all inside us. It's all internal work, on our attitudes and our outlooks, on our reactivity and our way of showing up, our way of relating to our own minds and relating to the world and relating to each other.
That it's all in us.
That nobody else needs to change for you to be happy.
Nothing.
The world doesn't need to change. It can stay in its ******** state of ignorance and greed and hatred; the world can stay just the way it is, and we can learn to not suffer at it or about it.
That doesn't mean we wouldn't have tremendous compassion for all the ignorance and confusion and forms of oppression and the ability to care deeply; and to not suffer. To have equanimity. To be at ease in the midst of total acceptance with the world, and still working for a positive change.
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