Nepo says that when he was young he talked fast and loud.

Sometimes, I still do.

What he did not realize until much later in life is that “I kept talking faster and louder to the world around me because I couldn’t hear the world within me.”

A profound sutra.

When I read those words, I shuttered within.

Why? Because he was kind of describing me, especially when he warned, “Do not mistake the need to hear with the need to be heard.

Wow!

Don’t you think that sometimes we do not enter the world within – what Jesus referred to as “the Kingdom within” – because we do not want to hear the messages coming from there…or, maybe it is that we’re afraid of what we will hear.

My friends, here’s what I’ve been learning, having regularly visited my inner world for several years now. I now go there daily and I can tell you, unequivocally, there is nothing to fear. There is nothing you’ll hear that won’t heal you.

Easterners call it meditation; Christian Benedictine monks call it “praying without ceasing” (1 Thess 5).

You can call it whatever you like.

The fact is, going within is the way to transformation. It is the only way.

If you want your outer world to be different than it is, something has to change internally. Your outer world is only ever a reflection of your inner world. If it isn’t working around you, it isn’t working within you.

Oh, sure, you can blame your circumstances, other people…many do. You can complain, criticize, and so judge others and the world as if it all one huge, unfair place toward you. You can say things like, “He makes me mad.” “If it wasn’t for her, my life would be peaceful!”

Think the world sucks?

I assure you, the world without IS your world within.

Others may push your buttons, to be sure, but you, my friend, control the volume.

Nothing will ever change around you until something changes within you.

“But,” you say…

No “But’s!”

“But, if I could just win the lottery…just get a better job…if I had not married him…I would be happy!”

You really believe this internal message?

You, my friend, have much to learn about life…much to listen to that your voice in the head mistakenly believes. You, my friend, have many beliefs that need questioning.

The world around you is but a reflection of the world within you. It has only ever been this way. Which is precisely why Jesus taught, “The Kingdom is within you” (Lk 17:21).

Learn now to go within and watch the world without transform before your very eyes.

Start today. Take a walk within. See where it leads. You will not be disappointed. That’s a promise.