How to have Peace at Home

The very definition of ideal worldly life is ‘Adjustment’. The more you adjust, the more your energies will increase and your weaknesses will diminish. People too will notice you and shall say, “There are clashes in every household except this one!”

To maintain peace at home recognize the nature of the people in your home

Everyone is human, but you do not know how to recognize this. There may be fifty people in the household, but because you do not recognize their nature, disputes arise. You need to recognize their differences. If one person in the house complains all the time, then that is his nature. Once you recognize this fact, you need not do anything further. You need not analyze him any more.

Some people have a habit of going to sleep late and some go to bed early. How can they get along? What would happen if they all live together under one roof as a family? Someone in the home may say, “You are an idiot.” At this time you should accept the fact that this is the manner in which this person speaks. This is how you adjust. If you return his insult, you will exhaust yourself and the conflict will continue. That person has collided with you, but if you collide with him, then it just goes to prove that you too, are blind. You should understand the differences in the nature of human beings in order to make it easier for you to adjust.

Peace at home

The key to experiencing peace at home has been unveiled by Param Pujya Dada Bhagwan. Let us read about it, in His own words:

Questioner: The important thing is that there should be peace at home.

Dadashri: But how can peace prevail? For peace, you have to understand dharma (religion, one's duties, moral code of conduct). You should tell everyone at home, "We are not each other's enemies; nobody has any quarrels with anyone. There is no need to have differences of opinion. Let us share with each other what we have and let us be happy." That is how you should think and do everything. You should never quarrel with people at home. How can you quarrel with people you have to share the same home with? Nobody has ever been happy by making others miserable and we want to be happy by giving happiness. We can only be happy if we make others happy at home. You will be served a good cup of tea with a smile, if you avoid conflicts with this understanding. Otherwise, they will ruin your tea before they serve it to you.

Look how many worries and inner differences there are! A person continues to harbor differences of opinion, yet he thinks he practices religion. Ask him if the quarreling has ceased in his home. Has it even decreased? Have his worries become less? Does he have at least some peace? To that he will say, "No, but at least I practice religion." You fool! What religion do you have? Being religious means, you are at peace within and regardless of your situation in life you do not have any stress, whether it be internal or external. To revert to your Real nature [the Soul], is the final definition of religion.

If your wife drops a stack of china dishes and glassware, would you be affected by it?

If you are affected or you feel hurt, you cannot refrain from saying something; you cannot prevent turning on your 'radio'. The moment you get hurt, your radio will come on, which in turn will hurt her. Then she will point out, "You act as if you never break anything." It is important to understand that glassware can easily slip and break. If you were to tell her to break the dishes, would she do so? Who or what breaks them? There is no person in this world with an independent strength or power to break even a single dish. All these events that take place are accounts that are being settled, and therefore all you have to do is ask her whether or not she was hurt.

If you both fight over a couch, then throw that couch away. That couch is worth only a few hundred dollars. Is it worth fighting over? It will only sow seeds of hatred. Just get rid of it. Anything that causes conflicts in the home should be thrown away.

The more you understand, the greater your faith. With faith you will acquire results. Without faith, nothing will help you. If you do things with understanding, your life will be happy and it will make her life happy too.