By Jill Hope
Over the last 2 weeks, I’ve been sharing some of the deep messages I received while on a recent family trip to the Rocky Mountains. The first 2 lessons I shared came from my young mountain guides who facilitated some of our activities.
Today, I’d like to share the final lesson I learned. This one didn’t come from a mountain guide, but rather, from the mountains themselves. And it really was an awareness, more than a lesson.
It was our final day, and rather than just appreciate our beautiful view, we decided to do a 7 mile hike up one of the mountains that was our back drop. On our way up, we saw several families, but the higher we got, the fewer people we saw.
After a while, I realized we were alone on the mountain. It was really quiet and still. We got to a certain point about ¾ of the way up where I stopped to gaze at the view.
What happened next was a little like stepping into another dimension.
I realized that in a relatively short time, we had gone from being within the mountains, where we could only see a view of the peaks, to being what felt like on top of the mountains.
As far as the eye could see, all I saw were mountains. From that vantage point, I felt like I was seeing all that ever was and ever will be.
I had a feeling of incredible peace. I tried to think about my problems, but could barely conjure them up. I felt like they didn’t exist up there.
This is when I heard the message. “There is only peace, there is only abundance, all is well”.
I’ve read hundreds of articles and books about peace, abundance, and how truly all really is well. But I never really felt the meaning before. This time was different. I felt it.
I was it. Peace, abundance, well-being. I was all of those things.
Upon our descent, I thought what a wonderful gift those mountains just gave me. To really grasp the feeling behind the words. To become them.
But then I realized the higher truth. That feeling of peace, abundance, and well-being didn’t come from the mountains. It came from inside me.
And truth be told, is always was, and it always will be there, inside of me.
We all have within us that place of total peace, abundance, and wellness, no matter what is going on in our outer circumstances.
We don’t feel it most of the time because we usually put our focus on the opposite of these feelings: Stress, frustration, lack, dissatisfaction, etc.
We can’t feel peace when we are feeling stressed out. Likewise, we can’t feel stressed out when we are feeling at peace. Remember when I tried to think about my problems in the midst of my strong sense of peace, abundance, and well-being? I couldn’t feel them.
While we can all have moments like the one I had on the mountain, creating them at will is something else altogether.
How can we step outside our problems when they seem to be such an on-going presence in our lives? I think it starts with the simple awareness that peace, abundance, and well-being is always present within us.
By reminding ourselves that somewhere underneath our challenges also lies our peace, may we see a glimpse of it. It may come in the form of a kind word from a friend, an insight that came out of the challenge, or from being amongst the beauty and abundance of nature.
Your challenge is to catch a glimpse of the peace, abundance, and well-being that is always a part of you, waiting to be discovered, regardless of what is going on.
I know I will be more intentional in bringing to the surface more often those feelings I had on the mountain that day.
