The light is always warm. It’s never cold or distant. It invites us into positive experiences. There isn’t an inner light that is negative. Light glows and is always pure. There isn’t a murky light in healing or meditation. It radiates and permeates all the spaces of the body and our being. When we make ourselves available to self-existing light, it’s freeing and we feel alive. The light is life! Another reason it’s freeing is that light is always open. We may contract to the light for various reasons, but there’s no contraction in the light itself. It’s expansive and infinite. The light goes on and on. In its expanse there’s much peace and we feel greatly comforted. And light heals. There’s no doubt that light heals. It’s light that heals. The light is life force and love. We can also wear it like a protective garment, and carry it like a protective shield.

As part of the Reiki Training I provide, I offer a lot of mentoring and support. One format this takes place is a practitioner-only meeting every month, a dojo meeting. And often in these meetings we crowdsource wisdom by sharing and listening.

Last week I asked participants how they were going to make the light more visible in 2012. This is what emerged!

• Encourage others: This is in regards to all the people around us. Encouraging people is a natural outgrowth of living a life of spiritual healing. When we ourselves become empowered, healed and benefit in all the ways spiritual practice adds to our life, we’re naturally motivated to lift others and have the resources to do so.
• Open minds: Healing transformation and spiritual growth need a certain willingness and ability to entertain possibilities. Without open-mindedness we don’t leave outdated beliefs and patterns behind. Helping others open their minds to greater realities is a way of sharing the light.
• “Taking care of your own house”: It all starts with ourselves. We have to engage the light first within our being and establish it in our heart and mind, and in our life. Otherwise it isn’t authentic, and we aren’t able to really bring the light into all the spaces the world needs it.
• Being present/mindful: This may seem obvious, but putting it into place and remembering it every moment is quite an undertaking. And it’s a prime way of sharing light. In presence and mindfulness we can drop expectations and judgments, and be with others and life in a natural, open way.
• Just being: This is a state of simply being the light we are. Often we are on the way to becoming this or that. We have to-do lists, goals and ambitions. Those have their place. But constantly being on that treadmill is exhausting!
  
• Smiling: The light spreads so wonderfully when we smile genuinely. It lights up others’ faces and lightens their hearts.
• Selflessness: When we receive so many blessings because of our dedication to our path, it becomes harder to hold on to them selfishly. There’s a natural abundance in blessings and it wants to be part of a domino effect of giving.
• Next generation: These are our kids, and all younger folk. They carry the light of the future as it is. As conscious and compassionate adults, we have a significant role to play in modeling how best the light can be harnessed and embodied.
• Service: This is outreach. Being full, we give. The light passing through us without resistance is limitless and more than enough for anyone who needs it.
• Listening: This is an echo of being present. Both the world and the earth, as well as other people and species need us to hear them! We’re wrapped up in our own busyness and distractions, but with spiritual practice we’re able to lower the noise and focus on the signal. If we listen without filters, the light flows unhindered.

Reiki is light. Life force is light. Ki is light. Light is consciousness. I’m a fortunate teacher to have people come to me to learn Reiki who can articulate and express so many facets of the light in a single meeting, spontaneously. I didn’t ask them to prepare these responses beforehand.

Light that is knowingly radiated into the world has a different vibration from light that is unknowingly brought into life. Light that is knowingly directed carries consciousness. It vibrates at a higher frequency and can directly interact with the consciousness of those whom it affects.

— Llewellyn Vaughn-Lee

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This doesn’t mean silence has no value or we shouldn’t aspire to it. Silence is a remarkable counterbalance, one that’s vital for us to cultivate with the understanding that silence doesn’t have to be ‘silent’ to be effective and life restoring. Silence is really an orientation. It’s an inner hub, and flows through all activity, engagement and stillness as long as it’s cultivated.

The problem with the various kinds of noise we have to contend with around the clock is that they separate us from what is whole, true and beautiful in us. Noise keeps us off kilter. It doesn’t allow our naturalness to be, to inform our life. Noise pushes us to keep doing more. Not in a healthy, creative and productive way, but for the sake of doing alone. We do and do until we no longer are, until we walk away from ourselves.

There are many ways silence can touch us. Reading a book is one, especially if it’s poetry like haiku or some other short form. Sitting in nature without any objective. Taking a bath. Listening to quality, inspirational music. Yes, listening. Mindfully. Listening to your own heart. Not it’s beat, although that’s affirming too, but listening to its guidance and perspective. Preparing a meal, consciously, slow food style. Eating consciously, without too much talking. Sleeping in a hammock.

Meditation is of course a primary way to touch silence. Here we notice how unquiet the mind is. It’s constantly churning. Churning and churning, to what effect?

The mind can be quieted. Everything we have at our disposal to lessen the noise is useful. We have to fins ways to be the silence. Otherwise the noise swallows us up and we can’t hear ourselves, each other, life, or the numinous and the mystery. We have to be able to hear the mystery, for as Lewis Hyde says, “The passage into mystery always refreshes.”

Find the hub of silence within that refreshes.

There is an inner silence and an outer silence and a silence that transcends inner and outer, a silence of the breath and a silence of the body, a silence in the absence of words and a silence when the world is quiet, a silence where there is no sound and a silence that can be heard, and there is a silence that is a passage to emptiness, a silence of the mind in which there is no thought. There is a silence which is a response, a silence which is a truer witness than words. — Ralph Davis

Related:

Silence
Silence… again
Anchoring silence

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This special date has been promoted and commemorated here every year since this blog’s inception in 2007. You can avail yourself of the richest resources linked in my post for 2008. Below are some other ones.

Paramahansa Yogananda 1893 - 1952

I’d like to start with some thoughts by a world teacher who brought a spiritual perspective to global peace.

“Resolve that you will love the world as your own nation, and that you will love your nation as you love your family. Through this understanding you will help to establish a world family on the indestructible foundation of wisdom…”

“War results from selfish patriotism, which does not recognize the kinship of all humanity….It is because of man’s ignorance of his divine nature and his lack of spiritual balance that nations are using engines of war to destroy one another…”

“Our vision is obscured from our very birth by the prejudices of family, race, and nation. Prejudice is a principal cause of war between brother nations. We shall never understand ourselves or others unless we keep our understanding free from all clouds of prejudice….

“Be more proud that you are made in the image of God than that you are of a certain nationality; for “American” and “Indian” and all the other nationalities are just outer coats, which in time will be discarded. But you are a child of God throughout eternity. Isn’t it better to teach that ideal to your children? It is the only way to peace: Establish the true ideals of peace in the schools, and live peace in your own life.”

“Man’s power to make war is increasing; so must his ability to make peace.”

September 21 is also a day of Global Ceasefire. The UN’s site has this to say: “By acknowledging a unified day without violence, a Global Ceasefire can provide hope for citizens who must endure war and conflict; it proves that worldwide peace is possible. A cessation of hostilities for 24 hours can also enable relief workers to reach civilians in need with food, water, and medical supplies.”

You can send an email urging your elected officials to support the day of Global Ceasefire (US Elected Officials Only). And sample wording for your email…

The website also has this excellent section: Personal Ceasefire(s). I’m 100% behind these practices:

What is a personal ceasefire?

• It can mean re-evaluating conflicts in our personal lives. Do we have relationships where confrontation or lack of communication is dominant? What can we do to improve these relationships?
• What can we do to make sure all members of the family feel seen and heard? Why not declare a 24 hour ceasefire between siblings, where every quarrel has to be solved in a creative and peaceful way? Parents show by example!
• In school, are there people that are left out or harassed? What can we do to stop this? Declare September 21 a day of ceasefire at your school.
• At work, is conflict and competition affecting how people perform their duties and how they feel about themselves? Initiate a team-building activity focusing on communication and conflict resolution.
• In your community, are there groups of people that don’t get along? How can we as an interest group reach out to others and start a conversation?
• Imagine the impact a day of ceasefire could have in gang-related violence.

There are worldwide Peace Day events. Find one here you can participate in with family and friends.

There’s a live stream of the Annual Peace Day Global Broadcast in honor and celebration of the United Nations International Day of Peace.

Peace emanates from the soul, and is the sacred inner environment in which true happiness unfolds.
— Paramahansa Yogananda

Heart Light
© Pamir Kiciman 2010
Click to view full-size

We are a community of men, women and children.
We live, breathe and exist together in our community.
Our community is our home, even though we also have a roof over our own family.
Gathered under such roofs, we form neighborhoods.
We leave our neighborhood in the morning and return to it in the evening.
What is good for us is good for the community.
To protect our own is to protect the community.
What is best for the family is equally good for the community.

We are fond of boundaries.
Me, myself, my family, home, country.
My goods and future.
My health. My food. My money.
My beliefs and views.
Me. Mine. My own.

It’s natural to love one’s own.
It’s natural to shelter one’s own.
It’s natural to care more about your own.

Then again, we fight with our families and ourselves more often than with others.

Community is inside as well as outside.
Community is a state of mind.

Our state of mind is our first community.
It’s from our mind and heart that we decide how much to blame others.
Blame others for our own troubles.
If in our heart and mind we would find peace, we would find peace in our relationship with all people.

Relationship is a fact of life.
There are those we want to be with and those we have to be with.
We are in relation with others in many ways.
Our thoughts, feelings, needs, money, beliefs, views put us in touch with others.
These others are individuals, and groups of individuals that function as companies, institutions and governments.
There is a web of life. The stranger we see at the bank has similar relations.

We also share the web of life with Nature and its lifeforms.

The tree’s shade and a pet’s warmth are cherished. Wheat and oranges nourish us.
We relax and play at the beach. The web exists so that life works.

Are you ever angry at an apple you enjoy?

What makes us angry with people whether they are those we want to be with or those we have to be with?

Anger disappears when we share instead of hoard.
Anger disappears when we see that our family is similar to another’s family.
Anger disappears when we notice that the fruit tree that feeds us, feeds a child whose name we may not even know.
The same cotton that we wear is on someone else’s back, the same material on our feet protects another’s feet,
and the same steel that makes our car makes the neighbor’s car.

The sun shines on us all equally.

Peace appears when we emphasize similarities.
Peace appears when we honor natural variety.
Peace appears when we realize that everyone seeks the love we seek.
Peace appears when we accept that health; happiness and financial security are available to us as a human right and not at the expense of another.
Peace is seen in the web of life when we tell our fear to grow up!

There’s not a single person who doesn’t want the basics of life that we want.
These basics include tangible things as well as success, happiness, health, acknowledgment and fulfillment.
Since we have to participate in life in similar ways to attain similar results, is it not more productive to join efforts?
Is it not more powerful to manifest dreams with collaboration rather than competition?
Who wins when one person or group wins? Only that person or group and everyone else are losers.

Who’s the loser when everyone wins? The obstacles!

Obstacles are created by us and can be uncreated by changing our heart and mind.
For that we simply need willingness and reason.
Reason shows us that cooperation brings results.
Willingness takes us into our heart and mind where we develop flexibility and compassion.
When reason is coupled with forgiveness, we have a winning formula for social and personal success.

Let us remember that the formula of reason plus forgiveness has to be applied by citizen and leader alike.
Afterall, a leader is a citizen and a citizen is a leader.
Those who are elected or rise to prominence in some way are sanctioned as leaders, yet their power is in the hands of the people.

Forgiving leaders paves the path to start afresh.
Leaders returning that trust with sincerity and unwavering commitment, solidify the path.
People taking a real interest and becoming active with the power they have completes the shared responsibility of community.
Then everyone is on the same path, heading to unity and a better life for all.

Pain, grudges, disappointment, injustice, prejudice, lack of opportunity, education or housing, poverty, ill-health as well as all the other challenges of life, and the real solutions for these are the responsibility of every single member of society.

We are the only ones who can bring order to chaos.

We are the only ones who can bring peace to conflict.

We are the only ones who can bring sanity to anger and hatred.

We are the only ones who can correct errors.

We are the only ones who can heal wounds.

We are the only ones who can monitor each other for the good of all.

We are the only ones who can use reason to see that the web of life is inclusive and not exclusive.

We are the only ones who can forgive and move on.

The past keeps us in the past. The future is ours to live. The present is where we act, assert and voice our common vision.

Mother, father, child, business owner, politician, teacher, student, professional and unemployed, WE populate our communities.

We are the only ones who can make it a place worth living.

We are the only ones who can create a new history.

We are the only ones who can…

◊ ◊ ◊

To see more of Pamir’s meaning-making photography, visit his photoblog.

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The original prayer is creation itself. As created beings we are a prayer onto our own. Prayer here means the lived experience of sacredness, not its usual religious context. Sacredness isn’t confined to one aspect of life. Sacredness has always been the single thread that runs through life.

Pray for Peace

Pray to whomever you kneel down to:
Jesus nailed to his wooden or plastic cross,
his suffering face bent to kiss you,
Buddha still under the bo tree in scorching heat,
Adonai, Allah. Raise your arms to Mary
that she may lay her palm on our brows,
to Shekhina, Queen of Heaven and Earth,
to Inanna in her stripped descent.

Then pray to the bus driver who takes you to work.
On the bus, pray for everyone riding that bus,
for everyone riding buses all over the world.
Drop some silver and pray.

Waiting in line for the movies, for the ATM,
for your latte and croissant, offer your plea.
Make your eating and drinking a supplication.
Make your slicing of carrots a holy act,
each translucent layer of the onion, a deeper prayer.

To Hawk or Wolf, or the Great Whale, pray.
Bow down to terriers and shepherds and Siamese cats.
Fields of artichokes and elegant strawberries.

Make the brushing of your hair
a prayer, every strand its own voice,
singing in the choir on your head.
As you wash your face, the water slipping
through your fingers, a prayer: Water,
softest thing on earth, gentleness
that wears away rock.

Making love, of course, is already prayer.
Skin, and open mouths worshipping that skin,
the fragile cases we are poured into.

If you’re hungry, pray. If you’re tired.
Pray to Gandhi and Dorothy Day.
Shakespeare. Sappho. Sojourner Truth.

When you walk to your car, to the mailbox,
to the video store, let each step
be a prayer that we all keep our legs,
that we do not blow off anyone else’s legs.
Or crush their skulls.
And if you are riding on a bicycle
or a skateboard, in a wheelchair, each revolution
of the wheels a prayer as the earth revolves:
less harm, less harm, less harm.

And as you work, typing with a new manicure,
a tiny palm tree painted on one pearlescent nail
or delivering soda or drawing good blood
into rubber-capped vials, writing on a blackboard
with yellow chalk, twirling pizzas–

With each breath in, take in the faith of those
who have believed when belief seemed foolish,
who persevered. With each breath out, cherish.

Pull weeds for peace, turn over in your sleep for peace,
feed the birds, each shiny seed
that spills onto the earth, another second of peace.
Wash your dishes, call your mother, drink wine.

Shovel leaves or snow or trash from your sidewalk.
Make a path. Fold a photo of a dead child
around your VISA card. Scoop your holy water
from the gutter. Gnaw your crust.
Mumble along like a crazy person, stumbling
your prayer through the streets.

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Here is why having a spiritual ground is an important aspect of wellness:

• Spirituality unifies all the dimensions of health and wellness, these being physical, psychological, social, and of course the spiritual itself.
• It provides a continuum and empowers all aspects of health.
• Because spirituality transcends the individual, it fosters such essential qualities as love, compassion, care and altruism.
• Spirituality brings vital meaning to life.

In its most general sense, spirituality is a way of contemplating and understanding the invisible aspects of life and to transcend the personal, tangible and finite details of this world. This transcendental spirituality is needed because it provides vision, inspiration and profound meaning. And spirituality may include faith, although it doesn’t have to, to be valid and helpful.

(If you’re reading this as an email, you’ll need to click back to the original post on the blog to view video content, or you can go here to view it.)

Cross-culturally and from all time periods, every authentic spiritual teaching that’s part of humanity’s heritage has always included a set of methodologies. Reiki is one such teaching. These teachings are commonly known as wisdom traditions, or teachings of perennial wisdom.

A teaching of perennial wisdom includes ethical and moral dos and don’ts; a central cosmology explaining creation, the universe, life and humanity’s place in it; other subtle truths; and practices to give the practitioner access to this knowledge and wisdom.

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• Healing is a big picture event. Details change when you stay the course.
• You can’t heal what you don’t know about. The courage to be aware is primary.
• Healing isn’t a cure as a cure is in time/space, whereas healing is abiding.
• Symptoms are signposts from the soul as to what you need to heal.
• Symptoms are data in time. Healing takes place at a meta level.
• Healing is a return to your source code.
• Healing never happens in a vacuum. You have to show up.
• To heal is a mindset and lifestyle, not a tool you pull out only at the time of need.
• When you come to healing with willingness, you’re lifted up and kissed by the light.
• Welcome the light that comes in healing, give it a station in your life and it will stay.
• Once you start unraveling your suffering, healing gently rolls through your life again and again like a ball of yarn.
• The healed is hiding in the unhealed.

And community:

• Community is inside as well as outside. Community is a state of mind.
• What is good for us is good for the community. To protect our own is to protect the community.

And peace:

• Peace appears when we emphasize similarities
• Peace appears when we honor natural variety.
• Peace appears when we realize that everyone seeks the love we seek.
• Peace is seen in the web of life when we tell our fear to grow up!
• Peace arises from where it lives within when we silence enough to notice.
• Listen to the peace whispered by the breeze in the leaves.
• Morning dew simply appears, silently. Peace is the same way. Make space for it.

What do you think?

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Welcome to the 177th Carnival of Healing. This is the first time I’m hosting it and have enjoyed collecting the multimedia content presented.

To make the Carnival really fun and valuable, go ahead and visit each of the links, comment on those blogs to join the conversation, and also comment here.

One aspect of blogs that’s missed often is that real value is found in the comments that are sparked by the post itself.

Some of the content is actually in this post, while most of it links out to other blogs.

Make sure you spend time a little further down in this post with David’s The Blessed Discontent and Melanie’s healing energy charged art.

Your comments here would be appreciated in general, but you can also let me know what kind of content you most need, enjoy and would like to see more.

And in true carnival spirit, put on music you like best, make your favorite drink, settle and dive in.

Another way you can deepen this experience is to go back to the content you resonated with most and put it into practice, meditate on it and journal about it.

My collecting, reviewing and presenting of the material here was a considerable amount of work, so I hope it’s rewarding to you and I’d greatly appreciate your feedback.

Thanks also to all who submitted content.

Health tips

Maria Mora gives us detailed information about the many properties of the Helichrysum Species, which range from being antifungal, wound healing, good for muscle spasms and irritable bowel syndrome, to being used for colds, inflammation and allergies.

Edward Sanderson brings us ways to Wave goodbye to frozen shoulder which in Chinese Medicine is called 50 year shoulder because people tend to get it at middle age. I don’t know about you, but I’ve had shoulder pain since my twenties which healed greatly when I started meditating. Ed lists good solutions and links to some others as well.

Brad presents Cold Showers – Whew! including some studies that have been done regarding its benefits.

Julian Pollock presents Why Practise Qigong – for Health, Wellness, and Inner Balance in a simple, accessible piece.

Ross presents Health Benefits of Liquid Chlorophyll, a thorough look with a lot of support.

Healing / Transformation

And now on to some musical musings…musical and transformational. ggw_bach, yes that’s the name, is Bach in sunglasses! He composes classical music for today. You can listen to each piece at the end of posts, like the one he submitted for the Carnival: Step 19 – Regenerating the Core. After you appreciate it, go ahead and browse all the steps.

Here’s a quiet piece that packs a powerful message by Tim Rowe: On Healing. Tim’s post is full of golden nuggets about healing, the path and our place therein. Healers emerge from wounds; their own. He offers much including the basics of A Course in Miracles, synchronicity and projection.

Gina Loree’ Marks has “a strong belief in ‘messengers’.” There’s a quality of self-reflection in her posts that we could all adopt. In Discomfort Creates Awareness, she uses her interaction with a client to create clearer self-awareness and ask probing questions about how we hide from insights discomfort can provide.

Donald presents 10 Essential Tips to Change Your Life, a straightforward look at some cornerstones of change.

Lisis Blackston presents Finding Fulfillment. It’s a unique look at turning Maslow’s pyramid on its head.

Communication / Listening

Those of you who’ve studied Reiki with me, will be familiar with the next entry. Davina’s excellent post uses the simple quality of curiosity to lead to a richer experience and how it can become intuition. How Curious Moments Add Value breaks down ‘active,’ deep listening into three steps and what happens beyond…

Seth Simonds brings us More Than Listening: Being Present. In it he talks about the quality of being present that’s so lacking in many of our interactions: Truly caring about answers to questions you ask, feeling the subtext, and empathy.

Nonviolence

The Laughing Yogini, yes that’s how she is known, brings us Yoga Ethics #1: Ahimsa. This word literally means: a ‘non’ + himsa ‘injury.’ This precept isn’t only for the student of yoga, but for all of us. It’s quite the thorny one to practice and live, and Laughing Yogini provides much food for thought.

Miruh Sanderson comes to nonviolence from a different angle in Peaceful Thoughts. As I said, nonviolence is a thorny subject. I had blogged my thoughts about it back in Nov 08 in this post.

Healing Energy charged art

Moving Through Blocks

Melanie A. Stinson has a gift! “In Moving Through Blocks, the intention was to help individuals move through feeling “stuck” or blocked creatively and in any way in which the word applies.”

“The way to use the images is simply to gaze at them and breathe deep and slow as though you are breathing in liquid color and desire to “taste” the image with every fiber of your being. The colors and shapes invite the viewer to participate with the image, and, as in color therapy, the colors also serve to heal, transform, empower, bless, inspire and bring joy.”

Vortex of Creativity

“Vortex of Creativity, inspired by the Harry Potter books, holds an intention for creativity that I hoped would be as powerful as JK Rowlings’ books have been for readers all over the world.”

And last but not least by any means, please take time to read David Wodtke’s piece below. David is a soul brother of mine, who I’ve met only on webcam, over the phone and via email. That’s the beauty of souls and technology!

He’s also known as Pine Tree and publishes an excellent ezine of archetypal messages from animal spirits, to which you can subscribe at Earth Service.

The Blessed Discontent

by David Wodtke

“Why did I write? Because I found life unsatisfactory.”
–Tennessee Williams

Part of me feels very sorry. Sorry for myself and sorry for all of the sad people for being born into this miserable life of pain and disappointment. Failure and regret can eat away at your core until you collapse in a heap from exhaustion. But lately I’ve begun to feel oddly thankful for my discontent and to view it as one of life’s greatest blessings. It has been my teacher when I rejected all other guidance. Lately I’ve become grateful for my suffering which leads me in the direction I need to go. I’ve begun to feel a new source of strength and peace.

Of course, I want to be happy as much as you do. I’ve tried many ways to become happier and more peaceful. But all of the temporary pleasures of the world lead sooner or later to disappointment. This is most obvious with drugs and alcohol which seem to dull the pain for a time, but meanwhile weaken the body and will. That counterfeit peace soon causes even greater anxiety mixed with guilt. Other more benign pleasures can leave us feeling empty as well. Seeking happiness in romance, work, or even family can be disheartening. The lover leaves or dies. Work and family life go flat without a sense of inner peace and purpose. Everything in the world betrays us in the end. So what is behind this illusion? Where is the satisfaction that we all seek?

Do you remember a time beyond time when you lost all thoughts to the wonder and beauty around you? As a child I remember many times of great joy with no thought for the past or future. Music and writing take me close to that feeling of nowness. In fact, any time the mind is fully concentrated on one thing all worries vanish and a secret joy bubbles out from the core of being. Each moment is vibrating with sacred promise which can be felt in calmness. It’s only when the mind is scattered with thoughts of something more that worry and restlessness creep in. Where are the bursting joys and dire disappointments of yesterday? And where is tomorrow’s hope and fear of the unknown? All is happening now, the rest is imagined. I take comfort in the fact that the source of eternal love is always with me. I just need to relax and look inside myself to feel the blessing.

Meditation is a source of great peace and joy when the mind is calm. Creation and communion with the inner creator add satisfaction to everyday life by unlocking the heart’s natural love. When you least expect it, the gift comes, slipping in the back door on stocking feet. So when I feel sad or anxious lately I think to myself that it is a blessed discontent calling my mind back to the source of all happiness. Let that fear, worry, sorrow, or even mild apprehension be the trumpet call announcing the presence of the creator, locked in a dream tower of doubt and distraction. The worst mistakes and failures of the past are your greatest blessings. Give thanks for them and the prince charming of inner peace will come with the ladder of forgiveness to release you. Trials are not meant to destroy us, but to awaken us to the inner source of strength and beauty.

Carnival of Healing home
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The International Day of Peace has been observed since 1983.

The Japanese Peace Bell was presented to the United Nations in June 1954 by the United Nations Association of Japan. It was cast from coins collected by people from 60 different countries including children, and housed in a typically Japanese structure, resembling a Shinto shrine, made of cypress wood.

It has become a tradition to ring the bell twice a year: on the first day of Spring, at the Vernal Equinox, and on 21 September to coincide with the opening of the General Assembly. In 2002, the General Assembly set 21 September as the permanent date for the International Day of Peace.

Over the years, it has grown to include hundreds of thousands of people, showing their commitment to peace in diverse and creative ways. Peace Day events are organized by individuals and organizations all over the world. Peace Day celebrations also include annual observations at the UN headquarters, as well as many UN operations and offices around the world.

Peacebuilding 101

Peacebuilding is different from “peacemaking” and “peacekeeping” in that it focuses on creating a long-term culture of peace, rather than solving existing conflicts or preventing old ones from re-occurring. Peacebuilding activities aim at building understanding and tolerance between individuals, communities and societies and establishing new structures of cooperation. Peacebuilding activities range in scale from personal acts of kindness toward others to global inter-governmental programs.

Peacebuilding is the construction of new environments and new cultures which transform deficient structures and capabilities which unite the strengths of emerging innovations in all pathways of our local-global planetary life. Peacebuilding creates and maintains beneficial conditions for sustainable (life-enhancing) social, economic, political and spiritual development of all peoples. Learn more here.

The UN’s website dedicated to this special day has many ideas to plan and celebrate your own Peace Day event:

• Art & Culture
• Media
• Music & Performance
• Petitions/Government
• Education
• Spiritual
• Sports/Health
• Other/Mixed
• Kids

Dag Hammarskjöld the 2nd Secretary-Generalhas said: “Unless there is spiritual renaissance, the world will know no peace.” The United Nations has a long history and base in spirituality. A wonderful blog post by Diane Williams details some of this foundation, together with some eye-opening information and links to other spiritual NGOs.

And you can read the message of the Secretary-General in 2007 in the post I published on this blog.

Peace includes many things such has having the basic necessities of life, being secure in home and finance, having a healthy environment, welfare of family, an inner practice of loving kindness, and elevating others to have the same.

At this critical time in world history please dedicate time, as well as mind and heart power to the ideal and function of peace.

An eye for eye only ends up making the whole world blind.

–Mahatma Gandhi

Usui’s family was hatamoto samurai. The hatamoto were the shogun’s personal guard. The Usui family crest, also known as the Chiba crest, is a design that is a circle with a dot at the top. The circle is the universe, and the dot represents the North Star. The North Star is a polestar, it never moves, is ever constant, while life moves around it.

Three Japanese budo masters were contemporaries of Usui Sensei. Gichin Funakoshi founded Karate. Jigoro Kano started judo. Morihei Ueshiba created Aikido a little later on. Mikao Usui was born a Tendai Buddhist and studied in a Tendai monastery as a young child. At age 12 he began the practice of a martial art known as aiki jutsu, made popular by Takeda Sokaku who was Ueshiba’s teacher. This form included harmonizing with Ki, making it possible to experience calmness, concentration, willpower and physical fitness. He also studied yagyu ryu, and it’s interesting that this tradition includes both life-giving and -taking techniques.

About two years ago I had come across a Samurai’s song. It was impressive and thought-provoking. Let me share it here and we’ll look at some ideas that emerge.

A Warrior’s Creed

I have no parents
I make the heaven and earth my parents

I have no home
I make awareness my home

I have no life and death
I make the tides of breathing my life and death

I have no divine powers
I make honesty my divine power

I have no means
I make understanding my means

I have no secrets
I make my character my secret

I have no body
I make endurance my body

I have no eyes
I make the flash of lightening my eyes

I have no ears
I make sensibility my ears

I have no limbs
I make promptness my limbs

I have no strategy
I make “unshadowed by thought” my strategy.

I have no design
I make “seizing opportunity by the forelock” my design

I have no miracles
I make right action my miracle

I have no principles
I make adaptability to all circumstances my principle

I have no tactics
I make emptiness and fullness my tactics

I have no talent
I make ready wit my talent

I have no friends
I make my mind my friend

I have no enemy
I make carelessness my enemy

I have no armor
I make benevolence and righteousness my armor

I have no castle
I make immovable mind my castle

I have no sword
I make absence of self my sword

–Anonymous Samurai, 14th century

Admittedly it’s a little austere and minimalist. This has advantages, however. Many times, there’s nothing quite like a bare bones view to gain clarity and hone in on essentials. Let’s break it down.

• In Reiki we work very closely with heaven and earth in the form of Earth and Celestial Ki.
• Uncluttered awareness in the moment is key.
• Understanding is an enhancer of Reiki practice, whether it’s better results with techniques, or with people. When Reiki is practiced or shared with understanding, its power deepens.
• Reiki constantly gives us ample opportunities to improve our character.
• Quieting the busy mind is a core practice that rewards in multiple ways.
• Right thought, right speech, right action are built-in Reiki ethics.
• Being the bending but not breaking bamboo is the adaptability Reiki brings us.
• Knowing when to be empty and when to be full is a skill Reiki helps us develop.
• Befriending ourself is where healing begins.
• Being careful is a prime example of being full. Full of care.
• Reiki is the way of compassion, which includes benevolence.
• Immovable mind is the beginning and end of meditation.
• Absence of self in the Self is the way of peace and enlightenment.

Reiki is a way of living with wisdom and compassion. It’s a way to reclaim your authentic self. To move out of the past, return from the future and live fully awake in the present. Reiki shifts your paradigm too, revealing the many layers of reality. It helps you find energetic integrity. Reiki heals the human condition. It transforms your consciousness so you can be your true self. Your heart and mind become unified and you’re empowered to walk in peace. Reiki brings you what you need. Through the years, I’ve witnessed with inner joy and gratitude everything student practitioners share about their Reiki training experiences. These are nothing less thanpoetic and I’ll now attempt to convey some measure of what I was privileged to witness this past weekend.

An ocean, cloud and light was received. Plans changed many moons ago came to completion and an ordination was received. Tears inspired by sheer beauty flowed. Peace was tangible. Never before reached depth in meditation was commonplace. After lunch heartburn relieved completely. Back pain healed. Several first-time spiritual awakenings. The courage to face things one doesn’t want to. A young person’s talent validated. Success affirmed. Shoulders lightened. Realization of inner powers. Wonder. Recognition.

And hugs. Heart on heart hugs.

Always heart on heart hugs.

Updated July 2, 2008

An early testimonial:

“…Now that I have had a little time to reflect and absorb, I want to thank you for being YOU and what you brought to me this weekend. I can already notice changes in me, there is a deepening sense of calm within, much more energy both physically and spiritually. It has been both a fulfillment and rebirth of sorts. I am different, I am one with myself, and my surroundings. The teaching and empowerments brought through you this weekend are amazing. Thank you for thus far guiding and teaching me. The teaching and tools you brought to me will continue to aid and guide my journey…”

–J.G., West Palm Beach, Fla

Don Alverto Taxo, a Quichua elder and Iachak (community leader/healer), speaks of the ancient prophecy of the eagle and the condor meeting to bring a new harmony into the world. Don Alverto invites us all to trust the universal human intuition to bring greater harmony into our lives, and to seek after life’s deeper meaning. (Video below…if you have an email subscription, click to the original post to view it.)

© Pamir Kiciman 2007

Related:
Ever-present Love
Threshold of Healing
Spiritual Love
The Self
Self & Divine
Existence
Wholeness / Duality
Order & Unity
Rounds of Incarnations
Pain
Searching

Everything Around Us

Environment. What does it mean? The word itself is derived from Middle English ‘envirounen,’ from Old French ‘environner,’ from ‘environ,’ around, with further connotations of ‘see’ and ‘circle’ (Dictionary.com). Everything we see around us. Furniture (often made from trees), appliances, sky, fields, cars, ocean, mountains, buildings. Environment can be indoors or outdoors. As Gary Synder says, however: “Cities and agricultural lands…are not ‘wild.’ Wild is a valuable word. It is a term for the free and independent process of nature. A wilderness is a place where wild process dominates and human impact is minimal. Wilderness need not be a place that was never touched by humans, but simply a place where wild process has ruled for some decades.”

Why is it so important? Because we live in it. We breathe it, touch and eat it, smell and admire it. We also hugely impact it in every way, in all its aspects. And it gets even more complex: “The old Lakota was wise. He knew that man’s heart away from nature becomes hard; he knew that lack of respect for growing, living things soon led to lack of respect for humans too. So he kept his youth close to its softening influence.” (Standing Bear). We hurt the environment. This ends up hurting us. Does it also foster a wider disrespect? We live here, it’s unavoidable that we have an impact. That’s why it’s called a footprint. Can we make ours smaller and keep it out of each others’ face too?

The environmental concern is multi-faceted and every facet demands attention. To build on the momentum of a major environmental validation, let’s zero in on climate change. On October 12, 2007 Al Gore and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Wangari Waathai, a former awardee said this: “When it was first announced that I would be receiving the Peace Prize in 2004, many people asked what does the environment have to do with peace? By choosing Al Gore and the IPCC for the award in 2007, the Nobel Committee have rightly brought to our attention that climate change is the single biggest threat to world peace we have ever faced.”

There’s that wider disrespect once more. Standing Bear again: “For him (Lakota), to sit or lie upon the ground is to be able to think more deeply and to feel more keenly; he can see more clearly into the mysteries of life and come closer in kinship to other lives about him….” Something is definitely going on here. Could it be that we’re in symbiosis, human to human, human to Earth, Earth to human?

We actually need greenhouse gases. A natural blanket of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere keeps the planet warm enough for life as we know it at a comfortable 15°C today. Human-caused emissions of greenhouse gases have made the blanket thicker, trapping heat and leading to a global warming. Fossil fuels are the single biggest source of human-generated greenhouse gas emissions.

The IPCC is the top authority on global warming, comprising more than 2,000 leading climate change scientists and experts. It agrees that human activity causes global warming. Here’s some data:

• If no action is taken on greenhouse gases, the Earth’s temperature could rise by 4.50°C (8.1°F) or more.
• The Arctic is warming twice as fast as the global average.
• Changing weather patterns threaten to exacerbate desertification, drought and food insecurity.
• Floods, sea level rise and extreme weather events.
• Climate change will hit the poorest and most vulnerable the hardest, but it will affect everyone.

Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth website has this science (see sources there)

• The number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes has almost doubled in the last 30 years.
• Malaria has spread to higher altitudes in places like the Colombian Andes, 7,000 feet above sea level.
• The flow of ice from glaciers in Greenland has more than doubled over the past decade.
• At least 279 species of plants and animals are already responding to global warming, moving closer to the poles.

If the warming continues, we can expect catastrophic consequences.

• Deaths from global warming will double in just 25 years — to 300,000 people a year.
• Global sea levels could rise by more than 20 feet with the loss of shelf ice in Greenland and Antarctica, devastating coastal areas worldwide.
• Heat waves will be more frequent and more intense.
• Droughts and wildfires will occur more often.
• The Arctic Ocean could be ice free in summer by 2050.
• More than a million species worldwide could be driven to extinction by 2050.

Many greenhouse gas-emitting activities are now essential to the global economy and form a fundamental part of modern life. There too many underlying factors behind these findings, a confounding web of driving forces to list here. The one area where we have immediate influence is our own lifestyle, knowledge, willingness and worldview. “It is an extraordinary privilege to be accorded a human life, with self-reflexive consciousness that brings awareness of our own actions and the ability to make choices. It lets us choose to take part in the healing of our world.” (Joanna Macy.) Self-reflexive consciousness doesn’t leave us any wiggle room. Since we are a species that possesses such a consciousness, one that can think for and about itself, reflect, assess and learn, we have to use it and use it keenly.

Our actions and what we invest in must be informed by the highest functions of this self-reflexive thinking. We actually have to use our noggin! Having this capacity puts the burden of responsibility on humans. It’s probably unrealistic to think that everyone in the ‘burbs is going to commute via carpool, public transit, bicycle or walking. Those choices are realistic for many people, and we do have the choice about what we drive and how we drive it. Do you drive an urban assault vehicle or what used to be known as a car? Do you drive at the speed limit, or weave in and out of traffic, speed, and end up at a red light with all the vehicles you just overtook, heart beating, shoulders tense, a scowl on your face, right foot ready to do it all over again?

Proper tire inflation can improve gas mileage by more than 3%. Every gallon of gasoline saved keeps 20 pounds of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. We’re not going to ask our kids to do homework by candlelight. But, we can replace a regular incandescent light bulb with a compact fluorescent light bulb (CFL). CFLs use 60% less energy than a regular bulb. This simple switch saves about 300 pounds of carbon dioxide a year. There are lists of painless, practical actions we can take in the resources listed below. The point here is that it starts with one household using its noggin. Let’s not be naive either to think that individual action will be enough to stem current trends of more, bigger, faster, but we can start at home, in our own environment.

The Earth didn’t ask us for compensation as it went through it’s cosmic birthing pains, cooled and life began growing in its perfect environment. It doesn’t ask us today for anything when it generously produces wheat and apples, lets us build on its surface and displays the most incredible colors for our enjoyment. The Earth is still free. Humanity has a cost.

To offset this cost, we are being asked to first admit responsibility, then think responsibly, and finally go out and act in ways that reflect our understanding of the integrity that must be honored between Earth and human. Joanna Macy again: “…graced with self-reflexive consciousness, we are endowed with the capacity for choice–to take stock of what we are doing and change directions…Weaving our ever more complex neural circuits into the miracle of self-awareness, life yearned through us for the ability to know and act and speak on behalf of the larger whole. Now the time has come when by our own choice we can consciously enter the dance.”

The larger whole. Wider respect. Climate change to the degree implicit in irrefutable data now available, or even to a lesser degree simply means that society as we know it may breakdown. The already tapped irreplaceable resources of the Earth will probably be further monopolized by the few for the few, aggressively protected and distributed militarily, to which resistance will arise. Since this has happened throughout human history, even at times when resources were plentiful, it’s not a big jump that it can happen in a global crisis. This is not a doomsayer’s pessimism. Instead, it’s one way to connect the dots between global warming and global peace. Ultimately it doesn’t matter to what temperature we allow global warming to rise. We are already consuming nonrenewable resources at an alarming rate, climate patterns are affecting sustainability and species are disappearing. We need to cool it now, not wait and debate the possible end of civilization.

Traditionally peace is cultivated from the healing of hearts and minds, through forgiveness, understanding, compassion, education and active dialog. The playing field has changed. It’s no longer only the home, neighborhood, a border or region. Of the many things humans share, the planet is our most common ground literally. In bettering it, we better each other. In caring for it we care for each other. In mobilizing on its behalf we mobilize on each others’ behalf. In acting to reduce the causes of climate change we tend our own backyard, and those of total strangers in far off lands. Strangers or kin? Will my backyard stay green if yours is parched? What do we owe the Earth and ourselves, more importantly our children?

This writing ends here, but Standing Bear gives us a worthy model with which to begin: “Kinship with all creatures of the earth, sky, and water was a real and active principle…This concept of life and its relations was humanizing and gave the Lakota an abiding love. It filled his being with the joy and mystery of living; it gave him reverence for all life; it made a place for all things in the scheme of existence with equal importance to all…Everything was possessed of personality, only differing with us in form…We learned to do what only the student of nature ever learns, and that was to feel beauty…and the fact was appreciated that life was more then mere human manifestation; that it was expressed in a multitude of forms.”

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Resources:
The Alliance for Climate Protection
Sierra Club: Global Warming & Energy
World Wildlife Fund: Climate Change
UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

© Pamir Kiciman 2007

Peace is one of humanity’s most precious needs. It is also the United Nations’ highest calling. It defines our mission. It drives our discourse. And it draws together all of our worldwide work, from peacekeeping and preventive diplomacy to promoting human rights and development.

This work for peace is vital. But it is not easy. Indeed, in countless communities across the world, peace remains an elusive goal. From the displaced person camps of Chad and Darfur to the byways of Baghdad, the quest for peace is strewn with setbacks and suffering.

September 21, the International Day of Peace, is an occasion to take stock of our efforts to promote peace and well-being for all people everywhere.

It is an opportunity to appreciate what we have already accomplished, and to dedicate ourselves to all that remains to be done.

It is also meant to be a day of global ceasefire: a 24-hour respite from the fear and insecurity that plague so many places.

Today, I urge all countries and all combatants to honour this cessation of hostilities. And I ask people everywhere to observe a minute of silence at noon local time.

As the guns fall silent, we should use this opportunity to ponder the price we all pay due to conflict. And we should resolve to vigorously pursue ways to make permanent this day’s pause.

On this International Day, let us promise to make peace not just a priority, but a passion. Let us pledge to do more, wherever we are in whatever way we can, to make every day a day of peace.

There is peace in turmoil; joy in depression; wisdom in greed; and power in helplessness.

© Pamir Kiciman 2007

Peace to the five elements within and without.

Peace to this body.

Peace to this mind.

Peace to this huge ocean of emotions and feelings.

By the power of the truth and for the happiness of all beings,
may we have a culture of peace,
a society of peace, a world of peace,
where we can have days of peace,
nights of peace, sleep with peace and dreams of peace.

By the power of the truth and for the healing of all beings,
may we have peace in all moments
and in everything.