Peace building | Dare Boldly

It was an evening of grace, of community, of peace-building.

We gathered under pregnant grey clouds lumbering slowly across the sky above us. We gathered, young and old, to remember, to commemorate, to be together.

The skies could not wait and rained down upon us.

The crowd stayed.

The event began and together, we held a conversation about peace. About nuclear disarmament, about what we as one people, one community can do together to create peace.

There was poetry and music. Drumming and flute and didgeridoo. Sheri-D Wilson performed a spoken word, Trevor Uruski and Ancient Echoes enchanged with their compelling music. Nobue Henmi, a young university student born and raised in Hisoshima shared her stories of visiting the A-bomb memorial as a child, the tears and fears of living under the dark cloud of what had happened before she was born.

Earth Beat performed 5 songs in 6 different languages. They were stunning. Japanese, Chinese, Iraeli and Arab singing together, in harmony. One voice. One people. One song.

Judy Atkinson and Circles of Rhythm drummed. Our hearts were stirred. Our minds opened.

It was the children who were the most disarming. In their simple and poignant offering of the story of Sadako, the young girl who in 1955 died of Leukemia, the A-bomb disease, she left a legacy of 1,000 origami swams as a reminder to all of us to never give up on peace. Never give up on believing we can find a way to disarm. Find away to live peacefully with one another.

We are one planet. One human race. One people.

The air I breathe is the air you breathe. The earth I walk, is the earth you walk.

When we walk in peace, we create peace around us.

When we arm ourselves to protect against one another, we are hurting ourselves and one another. We are actively engaged in defying peace, preventing it, stopping it.

There are so many ways to make peace.

It begins in each of our hearts.

It begins right where we stand.

It begins right where we are willing to let go of hatred, anger, discrimination…

It begins where we are.

What are you willing to do today to make peace in your heart? What are you willing to let go of? Hold onto? Change? Create?

A couple of years ago, I spent a year writing C.C. a love poem a day. Last night as I listened to poet/performer Sherri-D Wilson recite a poem she’d written about love and peace, I was reminded of the power writing a love poem a day had on my heart.

I decided, it is time.

Time to create peace.

Time to write a poem a day for a year about peace.

I begin. Where I am.

IT IS TIME

It is time.
Time to awaken, to rise up, speak up, step up
Time to open our hearts, shift our minds and let peace enter.
It is time to put down arms without fearing for our lives
Time to hold out our arms in love for every life on this planet we share
together
Together
it is time to move away from discord and unease
it is time to move into harmony and joy
loving kindness
and peace.
oh yes.
Peace.

It is time for peace
peace in our hearts
peace in our minds
in our families and communities
in our cities and provinces
states and countries
it is time for peace in all our world
It is time.

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Thank you Karen Huggins, Project Ploughshares Calgary, the 2020 Vision for Humanity Network, John Lavoie, Shinobu Apple, Sally Hodges and friends, Freshwater Creative, TSGI and all the many volunteers who helped make our gathering and remembering and building peace possible. And thank you Niki Baker whose vision several years ago gave space for the Floating Lantern Festival in Calgary.

Namaste.

I lay in bed and wrote my blog in my head this morning. Just fifteen more minutes, my sleepy mind cajoled. Oh come on, another five. Eventually, 15 + 5 equalled a half hour. When I did get out of bed, my blog had vanished with the dawn breaking over the prairies to the east.

Now, what was that thought? What were those thoughts of making a difference I so wanted to share?

In my grappling to remember my thinking, unease arose, discord rippled. Dang. Why didn’t I just get out of bed when I should have? Why didn’t I ignore the voice of slumber and awaken into my day when I was supposed to?

And in my discordant thinking and self-critical evaluation, my heart became unsettled. My thinking unclear.

I breathed. Deeply. I invited peace into my thinking. Let it sift down through the tendrils of unease into my heart. I breathed again. Slowly. Deeply and felt peace descend as my mind quieted and eased angst out of my heart.

Peace. It is within me. And when I allow myself space to feel it flowing through and in and of me, I settle into being present with grace and ease. And in the moment, the words flow.

While I was in San Francisco, here in Calgary on June 21, Summer of Peace Calgary 2012 kicked off. Over 200 people gathered to drum and sing and dance and share peace, love and joy. “Sounds like a 60s revival,” a friend said when I told her about the event.

I laughed. “Whatever era it revived, awoke or created, peace is needed today, just as much as it was needed back then.”

We all need it. Peace.

Where is yours? What does yours look like?

Are you a peace-warrior? Or, do you prefer to see yourself as a peace-builder? A peace-nik? Will you sit in it or march? Will you rise up or lay down before the guns of war, the volleys of strife, the staccato of unease washing over our world?

What will you do for peace? How will you make a difference that creates peace in our world today?

These are important questions we all must ask if we are to rebuild peace within our hearts. If we are to reclaim that state of grace that knows, deep within us, that being-at-peace within is our birthright, our natural way of being, our gift to the world.

What will you do to create as we invite everyone at Summer of Peace — Peace in the Heart. Peace in the Home. Peace in the Land. Peace in the World.

At Summer of Peace, we’ve created the Peace Academy — an opportunity for Calgarians to join together to dig into the fertile soils of peace that lay fallow within each of our hearts. Through dialogue and active engagement, we will nurture peace into fruition and in its blossoming out, we will create gardens of hope, love and joy for all to enjoy.

For five weeks of summer, the Peace Academy will open minds, touch hearts and lift spirits up. For five weeks of summer you can learn how to create peace within your heart, your home, land and world.

Now is the time for peace. No matter your age, no matter where you live, make peace a priority. There is no better time than Right Now to make peace with your past. To make peace with those for whom unforgiveness holds you in its thrall.

Make peace in your heart and let the peace within you become the world all around you.

What will you be doing this summer?

I’ll be making peace at the Peace Academy. Please, do come join me and others as we create a world of difference through re-building peace, one thought, one step, one deed at a time.

And from each one of us, the many will be connected. And in the many, we will create a world of difference. We will rebuild a world of peace.