Give the essence a home

The past few days have been about being a part of Brisbane community and finding a voice to speak out in solidarity with those pleading for mercy. I sit here exhausted, but knowing a new day will come.
There were many highlights to the 'Peace Fair'-- being together with Peace Fellows on a beautiful sunny day, helping to hang photos; having the opportunity center stage to speak out to the crowd (speech below)... but one of the most meaningful times was that spent talking with a man who had been to Iraq three times and seemed angered at 'us people' for proposing pulling out troops. He insisted things would just get worse for the people. We engaged back and forth for almost an hour, and the challenge this posed was formidable, and draining. But those moments I'll hold on to are those where we found true common ground. We discussed 'boxes' and 'labels' and agreed to let go of these as we spoke with one another... we acknowledged each other's frustration...
As we see one another as the emotional and vulnerable beings we are, have to hug the hope--

"Why Peace Day? What is the common force that brings us here?

We come together today, as people are doing all over the world, in a collective call for a renewal of humanity. Today is a time to step back and look ourselves in the mirror. We see pain, we see joy, we see violence, we see love, we see greed, we see selflessness. More than anything, as we gaze in our mirrors, we feel that we have the potential as a human race to be more--to be better--than what we currently are.

It's time to ask ourselves who we are... what are our lives on this earth about? Is it the cars, the glitz, the glamour, or our relationships with each other?

Media and world leaders often try to divide us into camps of good and evil. But we all know we all have shades of grey.

We recognize that we each carry wounds within us... that we are all fragile beings. If we can look at each other and see this, we can melt down the walls of fear and hatred and in their place build bridges of compassion and love.

I challenge you to dig deep beneath the ribbons, the brochures, the buzz words of 'peace' and 'justice' and grasp on to the core of what these symbols and words speak to... latch onto the essence of the message--the message that speaks to each one of us that we are capable of more, that we can rise up.

Let this essence rock and wrap your sould and give it a home there... so that it lives on from this passing day and becomes the driving force of your thoughts and actions tomorrow and all the days thereafter."

(followed by a reading of an excerpt from Maya Angelou's poem 'I the Rock' from Clinton's inaugural)

Every second day

Shower every second day, until the problem disappears. Thus reads the sign I witnessed being pasted up at the Queensland State Library today. Had me shaking my head, wondering who thought of suggesting that our environmental crisis will just 'disappear' someday if people walk around less than squeaky-clean every other day.

Last week I attended the lecture of a Thomas Homer-Dixon, author of _The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilization_. (for one of his recent articles, see http://www.homerdixon.com/download/prepare_for_tomorrows_breakdown.pdf). He laid out a rather depressing three-layered assessment of our world in its current plight. He explored questions of demographic pressure, energy scarcity (peak oil theory), environmental devastation, climate change, and the increasing gap between rich and poor. I appreciated his assessment of the 'deep causal' factor feeding all of these life-threatening global ills, which he identified as the growth imperative of contemporary capitalism.

Homer-Dixon explained that this imperative gained prominence after the Great Depression, when leaders decided that to prevent revolutionary movements, which could arise due to misplaced labor, the answer was to promote 'development'. In doing so, many societies have become obsessed with economic growth, and consequently, the western world has doubled in wealth in the past fifty years... but remains at the same level of happiness.

Not only have we not experienced greater fulfillment from wealth, but our environment has suffered immensely. In a few decades, ramifications may include moving populations inland from coastlines, digging deeper for water, pumping CO2 underground, etc.

This author stated that "no one is questioning the underlying logic of the growth imperative." I would argue that millions have been, but that political 'leaders' have not been listening. I reflect on the lessons non-natives could be learning from indigenous ways of treating our earth as our true Mother. Our fast-paced lives and arrogance have taken us far away the open-heartedness we would need to conceive of another way of being in this world.

How can we begin to shift back to 'center'? Can we begin to look at each other instead of ourselves or the endless products on the shelf, and ask how to weave again a unity? Find some hope in the ashes, open our ears to the wisdom of the true leaders among us...

When is the last time we had a conversation about what we consider to be our ultimate purpose here on earth? I'd suggest first asking a child...