“How to Prepare for Anything and Have Peace”

Today we live in a world where everything seems topsy turvy, yet we don’t have to have the world take over. No matter what we do there will be unforeseeable circumstances that can take place, such as tsunamis, earthquakes, and economic depressions. And most of the time it’s more about the mental stress than physical stress which gets us down, which in the end translates to physical stress. Here are a few ways to say focused, centered, and peaceful even if the world goes crazy.

Having a Regular Routine - Routines keep us grounded, they keep us centered in our life, instead of having our life centered around the media or all the negative things happening in life. Even when things get tough it’s vital to stick to a regular routine. A regular routine means normalcy and that brings a sense of being whole to our lives. If a person normally gets up at 6AM, it’s important to keep getting up early. It’s amazing what little things like getting up at the same time everyday can do to bring about peace. Also eat meals at the same time, even if times are lean, and their’s not much in the way of food, it’s still important to have those small meals together with other people at the same time everyday, thus creating a sense of connectedness.

Create a Loving Group of People - Having friends in the area is very important. Friends laughing together lowers our blood pressure and it also helps to eliminate stress and get rid of all those terrible stress hormones. Also as it says in all the spiritual texts, “Love thy neighbor as thyself” is so true. When we help others we also help ourselves, when we help others it sends a vital unconscious message to our brain saying “We are Not Alone” which the mind/body needs to feel at peace. Whenever we feel alienated from all the rest of the world we start getting depressed. And in emergency situations that’s just the opposite of what we need to do. It’s important to start building community before something happens, community will not just pop up over night by itself. We have to work at creating a loving caring network of people who are interesting in working together.

Take Care of Thy Body - In order to feel great mentally, we have to take care of our body thus we have peace. Eating junk food and being a couch potato doesn’t cut it if we have to save our life and the lives of others. It talks about this in all the spiritual texts as “Taking Care of the Temple” and there is a reason for that being in all these spiritual texts. If things get tough, the tough get going, the spiritually tough don’t sit around. They get up and do things, there is a lot that needs to get done. And if we don’t have a body that’s healthy then it’s going to be very difficult to get things done. So it’s important to put in a little effort now, and take care of our body by eating right and exercising daily. Just eating more fruits and veggies, and walking daily will do the trick, it’s not complicated or rocket science, it’s just simple things we can do. And science has shown that taking care of our body creates more mental resilience… thus we move forward and overcome obstacles.

Prepare for the Worst and Expect the Best - In many spiritual groups like the Quakes, the Mennonites, the Mormons, and many others groups it’s accepted that they will put away food and water away just in case something happens. And that used to the the case for everyone around the world at one point in time. We didn’t have disaster relief groups, FEMA programs, or anything else in the past. We had our own God given awareness that sooner something would happen, and we had to be prepared. This is not a pessimistic way of looking at life, it’s a prepared way of looking at life. Even the Egyptians, Babylonians, and Sumerian Cultures down through history all had granaries where they stored wheat, oats, corn, beans, and others crops for the future. Just in case the rains didn’t come or other unforeseeable circumstances took place.

Find Seclusion for the Mind - If we want to have inner peace when things are tough, we need to have inner peace before things get out of control. In real world situations it’s been shown those who have the ability to go inside and work with their mind and have the ability to overcome obstacles. Take for instance the prisoners of war who had terrible things happen to them. Those who had the ability to be OK with long periods of silence survived. It’s not the challenges that overcome us, it’s our mind. Thus those who meditate, those who get out in nature, and those who enjoy silence do well in difficult situations.

Prepare the Mind/Body for every eventuality… and all will be well.

Many Blessings to Everyone!

Dr. Paul Haider