The Way of the Warrior: An Ancient Path to Inner Peace

by Erwin Raphael McManus

As much evidence as there is around us that we desperately need to find our peace, there is even deeper proof within us of how peace has eluded us. When our hearts have not found peace, we become filled with the darkest expressions of ourselves. We’re filled with not only fear and doubt but also greed and envy, anger and bitterness, loneliness and disconnection, despair and hopelessness. Each of these are external forces that war against our inner worlds. We struggle with envy because we want the life that isn’t ours. We struggle with greed because we want to possess what is not ours to have. We struggle with feelings of insignificance because we have made our worth dependent on the opinions of others. We struggle with identity because we don’t know who we are outside of what we do. We struggle with loneliness because we are searching for love rather than giving it. We will never know peace as long as we are slaves to external forces of the world and create our identities from the outside in. We will never know peace if we lose the present because we are trapped in the past and paralyzed by the future. This is in no small part why we live in a culture crippled by depression and anxiety.