PEACE PILGRIM

A TRULY ALL-AMERICAN Sannyasini. That is the best way to describe this remarkable woman called Peace Pilgrim. In the traditional sense a sannyasini is a wandering nun, consumed with an eagerness to merge herself with the divine force, travelling the length and breadth of India, begging her food, sleeping where chance may bring her, sharing her spiritual thoughts with others, and just accepting what the Lord may dole out to her.

This was the pattern of Peace Pilgrim’s life for more than twenty-eight years. She travelled literally the length and breadth of North America, all fifty states, the ten provinces of Canada, and parts of Mexico. Well, one might not think this so remarkable if it weren’t for the fact that she did this continuous journeying on foot, never asking for anything: food, shelter, or transportation. She walked without a penny in her pocket. She had only the clothes she wore, and those consisted of pants, shirt, tennis shoes, and a short sleeveless tunic lettered boldly on the front “Peace Pilgrim.” How many pairs of tennis shoes she must have worn out during those years! Years that were counted from the time she was forty­ four until a few days before her seventy-third birthday. Just imagine her living like this, travelling, walking “like a leaf blown in the wind” until she was almost seventy­ three years old. Her message to all she met was simple, “This is the way of peace: overcome evil with good, and falsehood with truth, and hatred with love.” She talked about peace between nations, between groups, among people and the most important Inner Peace, which she talked about most often because that is where real peace begins.

There is only one thing that could inspire and sup­ port a journey of this extent and provide the strength to see it through for all those years, and that is absolute, uncompromising faith in herself and in God. Faith which comes and is sustained by the realization and direct experience of the ultimate truths of life.

PEACE Pilgrim was born July 15, 1908 into a hard­ working, resourceful family on a small farm in the eastern United States. In her youth she was happy to play in the woods and streams of the countryside. She had no formal religious training as a child. She said it would be less that she would have to undo from her mind later on. In her late teens she began her search for God. “What is God? What is God?” she inquired of many people, but never received an answer. Then she took another approach. She asked herself. She pondered deeply and was ultimately answered from within. She said, “I touched God intellectually as truth, emotionally as love, as goodness, kindness, a creative force, a motivating power, an over-all intelligence and an ever­ present, all-pervading spirit. That brought God close. I could not be where God is not. You are within God. God is within you.”

As she looked about the world, she became increasingly uncomfortable about having so much while others had so little. From this gnawing dissatisfaction she sought a meaningful way of life. After much prayer and contemplation, she felt a complete willingness to dedicate her life to serving others. She began to live to give instead of to get, and she entered a new and wonderful world, and a great peace came over her.

Then began her years of intense spiritual practice. And this stage continued for fifteen long, hard-fought but joyously rewarding years.

She explained her own inner process:

During the spiritual growing up period the inner conflict can be more or less stormy. Old habits and tendencies don’t die an easy death. The self-centered nature is a very formidable enemy and it struggles fiercely to retain its identity. It defends itself in a cunning manner and should not be regarded lightly. It knows the weakest spots of your armor and attempts a confrontation when one is least aware. During these battles, one must maintain a humble stature and be intimate with none but the promptings of the higher self.

The process toward inner peace is not necessarily taken in any particular order. The first step for one may be the last step for another. So just take whatever steps seem easiest for you, and as you take a few steps, it will become easier for you to take a few more.

The first preparation is to take a right attitude toward life. Stop being an escapist! Face life squarely and get down beneath the surface where the truths and realities of life are to be found. There is an art to living. No problem ever comes to you that does not have a purpose in your life, that cannot contribute to your inner growth. When you perceive this, you will recognize that problems are opportunities in disguise. It is through solving problems in accordance with the highest light we have, that spiritual growth is attained.

It takes the living quite a while to catch up with the believing, but now there is a living to give instead of to get. As you concentrate on the giving, you discover that just as you cannot receive without giving, so neither can you give without receiving. There is a feeling of endless energy, it just never runs out, it seems to be as endless as air. You seem to be plugged into the source of universal energy.

You are now in control of your life. Your higher nature, which is controlled by God, controls the body, the mind, and the emotions.

Henry Thoreau said. “If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.” Now you are marching to that different drummer: the higher nature instead of the lower nature.

Another preparation she emphasized is the simplification of life. “Try to bring inner and outer well-being into harmony in your life, to keep your desires down to need level. In this materialistic age we have such a false criterion by which to measure success. We measure it in terms of dollars, in terms of material things. But happiness and inner peace do not lie in that direction. Unnecessary possessions are only unnecessary burdens. If you know and do not do, you are a very unhappy person indeed.”

The following story was told by a professor of religion and philosophy. He and his wife were hosting Peace Pilgrim in their home for a few days. “I went to pick up Peace Pilgrim at the station. Seeing her standing at the curb as I drove up, I got out to greet her and then went to get her bags to put them in the trunk. Well, there were no bags, nothing. Whatever she carried was in the pocket of her tunic: a comb, toothbrush, her mail, some paper and a pen. This woman is serious business. My wife said that she felt she was in the presence of a tiger. We had another visit with Peace some fifteen years later, and she actually looked younger this second time.”

Peace Pilgrim continually emphasized, “Anything beyond need tends to become burdensome. If you have it, you have to take care of it! There is a great freedom in simplicity of living where you can find harmony between inner and outer well-being. We have gotten our­ selves so far out of harmony, because we are so way off on the material side. This is due to our inner well-being lagging so far behind our outer well-being. The valid practice for the future is on the inner side, on the spiritual side, so that we will be able to bring these two into balance.

“No one is truly free who is still attached to material things, or places, or people. Material things must be put into their proper place. They are there for use. But when they have outlived their usefulness be ready to relinquish them and perhaps pass them on to someone who needs them. Anything that you cannot let go of when you are finished with it possesses you, and in this materialistic age a great many of us are possessed by our possessions. We are not free.

“There is a well-worn road which is pleasing to the senses and gratifies the ego and worldly desires, but leads nowhere. And there is the less traveled path, which requires discrimination and renunciation, but results in untold spiritual blessings.”

Sri Ramakrishna said, “You have to turn the key to this world in the opposite direction, if you want to realize God.”

During this period of her spiritual practice and deliberate living there were hills and valleys, lots of hills and valleys. Then, in the midst of the struggle, there came a wonderful mountaintop experience – the first glimpse of what the life of inner peace is like.

In her own words: “I was out walking in the early morning. All of a sudden, I felt very uplifted, more up­ lifted than I had ever been. I remember I knew timeless­ ness and spacelessness and lightness. I did not seem to be walking on the earth. There were no people or even animals around, but every flower, every bush, every tree seemed to wear a halo. There was a light emanation around everything and flecks of gold fell like slanted rain through the air. This experience is sometimes called the illumination period.

“The most important part of it was not the phenomena. The important part of it was the realization of the oneness of all creation. Not only all human beings – I knew before that all human beings are one. But now I knew also a oneness with the rest of creation. The creatures that walk the earth, and the growing things. The air, the water, the earth itself. And, most wonderful of all, a oneness with That which permeates all and binds all together and gives life to all. Oneness. A oneness with That which many would call God.”

The inspiration for the pilgrimage came at this time.

TWENTY-EIGHT years. Tens of thousands of uncounted miles. How many people Peace Pilgrim met and inspired through her quiet, joyous ways!

A man once said to her, “I’m surprised at the kind of person you are. After reading your very serious message on the way of peace I expected you to be a very solemn person, but instead I find you bubbling over with joy.” She said, “Who could know God and not be joyous?”

To the end she stressed this message: “When you find peace within yourself, you become the kind of per­ son who can live at peace with others. Inner peace is not found by staying on the surface of life, or by attempting to escape from life through any means. Inner peace is found by facing life squarely, solving its problems, and delving as far beneath its surface as possible to discover its verities and realities. Inner peace comes through strict adherence to already quite well-known laws of human conduct, such as the law that the means shape the end: that only a good means can ever attain a good end. Inner peace comes through relinquishment of self-will, attachments, and negative thoughts and feelings. Inner peace comes through working for the good of all. We are all cells in the body of humanity – all of us, all over the world. Each one has a contribution to make and will know from within what this contribution is, but no one can find inner peace except by working, not in a self-centered way, but for the whole human family.

“The key word for our time is practice. We have all the light we need; we just need to put it into practice.”

Ray Berry