This is a day I actually look forward to each year. When it rolls around and I start seeing posts and reminders that it's coming, it makes me remember why I started writing about peace and why I started this blog. And in all that remembering, I feel more connected to what makes me feel most alive.
And if you know me, no surprises about what that is. It's the hope, the prayer, the vision that human beings could create a peaceful world. And not some dreamy Kumbaya kind of fantasy world without any conflict. Who'd even want that? Conflict is where we challenge each other, grow, and evolve; it's the needed drama of life that holds our interest in this wild journey and gives us opportunities to expand.
My hope is of a world where the core concepts of opposition and elimination of a perceived enemy are seen for what they are: fearful responses based on a false perception of reality.
There is just one interconnected web of relations here. The attempts to banish those people and things we deem evil are futile because even if we try to cut them out, we're still all connected. Throw people in prison: they are still connected, still having an impact on the web, and in the awful conditions that they are enduring in this time of mass incarceration, you better believe they're not in a state to make the best impact they could possibly make on the web of relations.
What would happen if we really realized this? Might our prisons look more like healing centers? Might we be more interested in engaging and healing antisocial behaviors, rather than harshly punishing and disconnecting?
Haven't you noticed: for all the wars we declare against all these bad things, we don't actually get safer streets, less terrorism, less drugs. We often get MORE of those very things we're fighting against. Opposition is actually feeding the thing we oppose.
I really believe in humanity, though. We'll get this lesson that keeps playing out in front of us, soon enough.
Please celebrate Peace Day today and feed your own creative juice into this dream that we are creating a world of peace.
Check out this link to learn more:
http://internationaldayofpeace.org/get-involved/
I'm headed to the Peace March happening in DC this weekend: peacemarch.com. Ken Nwadike, the guy behind the Free Hugs Project is the host of the March. I freakin love this guy! If you aren't familiar with him, check him out here: freehugsproject.com. I'm really hoping for a hug on Saturday!
And the one super easy thing you can do is give one little minute to peace today. From noon to 12:01, observe the Minute of Silence. The idea is that it will create a “Peace Wave” around the world as people in each time zone take that minute to just be still and feel the peace that already is here right now.
Let's ride this wave into the next chapter of the human experiment.
2 comments:
Great post, I hope you had a wonderful and Peaceful time!
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