We should always speak our peace, and never speak our anger, never speak our frustration, and never speak our annoyance. This is called non-violence.

When we break our commitment to our higher nature we violate our own real self. This is called violence. Keeping our commitment means staying on track; it means NOT looking for an excuse for our weaknesses or shortcomings. It means NOT breaking our principles to please our ego or the whims of our mind.

Principles have nothing to do with images. When we set a high standard for ourselves and make up our mind to live up to that standard, we cannot compromise with our principles, otherwise we will not reach our goal. For example, if you want to build an airplane—a real airplane, not just a model airplane—you will have to keep in mind the principles of aerodynamics. You will have to follow these principles, otherwise your plane will never fly! In the same way, we will remain grounded to our ego if we do not hold onto our principles. If we do not set a high standard for ourselves and make up our mind to live up to that standard, we will never attain our highest potential.

We have the potential to be mentally at peace and physically fit, but only if we follow the principles of sound mental and physical health. If we break those principles we will lose both our peace of mind and our health. We cannot violate the laws of nature (for example, live an unnatural life) and expect to be naturally healthy; instead, naturally we will be unhealthy. Similarly, we cannot violate the laws of Consciousness and still expect to be peaceful and content. As human beings, the law of our conscience tells us that we must be humane. We can never be at peace with ourselves if we are inhumane.

We can speak our peace only when we are at peace with ourselves; otherwise, we will only be expressing our ego, and that ego-expression is always hurtful. It doesn’t mean that we should be people-pleasers and be afraid to speak the truth. It just means that our words should correspond to our actions and should come from the depth of our being and not our ego. OM