The Mountain Is You

part of spiritual and metaphysical practices for centuries 
and has just recently become more mainstream with the 
development of popular psychology.
Albert Camus once said: “In the midst of winter, I found 
there was, within me, an invincible summer.”
That sums up the entirety of what inner peace really is: the 
understanding that no matter what is happening around 
you, there is a place of total knowing and calmness with-
in you. Not only are you capable of returning to that place 
when you need to, but it’s possible to live your entire life from 
there. The challenge is learning how to connect with it in the 
first place and rewire how you respond to your mind, which 
is always jumping from one worst-case scenario to the next.
You know when people reference knowing something 
“deep down?” They say things like: “I’m worried, but deep 
down, I know it’s going to be okay.” Or, “I’m angry at him, 
but deep down, I know he loves me.” What do you think 
they are referencing? Where is deep down? They’re talking 
about the place within them that has an infinite wisdom, 
a better understanding, and a more insightful perspective 
of what’s going on. It isn’t shaken by the stressors or fears 
that the mind wants to offer.

---

213
THE MOUNTAIN IS YOU
212
BRIANNA WIEST
So much of the process of finding inner peace is being 
able to get to that “deep down” place where you know and 
feel that ultimately everything will be okay.
There’s another metaphor in meditation in which calm-
ness is compared to steadying a lake or a large body of 
water. Your thoughts and actions are like stones in the 
water: They create a ripple effect. The point of medita-
tion is to make yourself quiet enough so that the water 
comes back to its natural stillness. You don’t have to force 
the water to be still. It does it on its own when you stop 
interrupting it.
The same goes for finding inner peace. It’s not so much 
something you have to create as it is something you have 
to return to.
C R E AT I N G A L I G N E D G O A L S
One of the most important parts of discovering your inner 
peace is that you trade in your desire for “happiness.”
Unfortunately, happiness is fickle. It can lead you to being 
attached to certain achievements, belongings, or specific 
circumstances. It can lead you to become dependent on 
other people’s opinions or life unfolding in a particular 
way. When your goal is happiness, you will always find 
just behind it a lingering sense of unhappiness—that’s 
how balance and duality works. Inner peace, however? 

---

213
THE MOUNTAIN IS YOU
212
BRIANNA WIEST
That’s the state in between the scales. When it’s your goal, 
there’s no way to lose.
This is difficult for most people, and often, people will 
continue to create stress, problems, and drama for them-
selves because their egos are still very much attached to 
thinking they need something external to make them feel 
good. This is the quintessential sign of someone who has 
not yet found their inner peace: They are searching, often 
frantically, for a sense of satisfaction, belonging, or wor-
thiness outside of themselves.
So really, it’s not that happiness isn’t a virtuous thing to 
which you should aspire, or that happiness isn’t something 
you’re ever allowed to feel. The reality is that inner peace 
is the true happiness, and everything else is just a false 
means of trying to convince yourself that you are “okay.”
Think about it this way: What do you typically imagine 
will bring you happiness? Money, a relationship, a pro-
motion? What happens when you achieve those things? 
Consistently, throughout all of humankind, the answer is 
the same: You return to your baseline. This is because this 
kind of happiness is not real. It is only being completely at 
peace with whenever you are in any given day that you will 
find a genuine sense of wonder, presence, and joy.