Contemplative teaching
On where peace is not found
The world gives pain and pleasure, but not peace
The world can give you pain and pleasure, but it cannot give you peace. For peace you have to look within.
What this verse points to
The line separates three things usually run together. The world is genuinely capable of delivering pleasure and pain — that is not in dispute here. What it is said to be structurally unable to deliver is peace.
If that is right, a great deal of ordinary effort is misdirected rather than insufficient, which is a more hopeful diagnosis than it first sounds.
Sit with it
Recall your last clear moment of peace and ask what actually produced it — the circumstance, or a pause in wanting.