Practice of Peace in Sweden--A reflection on the Issue

[EVERETT813 at aol.com]

Thomas: is anyone dealing with the question "If war and violence are so
horrible and are what we don't want, why are we not already peaceful?"   Who wants
violence?   Who wants war?   Why do we have war when few people want it?

Joelle and I have been noodling that question around for a while.   We think
it comes down to an inability to agree on whose 'story' is going to be told
and lived and our inability to allow someone else to live their story their way
and for them to allow us the same freedom.   We seem to have to have forced
agreements, codified into laws, which further entangle us (great article
recently in NY Times about how laws are strangling education in the US) in disputes.
 Lawyers abound.   Lawsuits follow.

Ex:   North Ireland.   Whose story will be the dominant paradigm.
Protestant or Catholic?   To which country do those counties owe allegiance?   Why is
that a question?   What laws and rules will be put in place that reflect the
different world views?   What is the fighting about?

Ex: Palestine.   We could ask many questions of the same order.   In fact,
wherever there is conflict, we can ask the question:   whose story is striving
to be told, agreed on, and lived?   Who is resisting the story and why?

The issue might become:   what does it take for a group of human beings to
allow and create enough space for freedom of choice (that doesn't compromise
someone else's freedom of choice) in how they live their lives?   What is the
mental, emotional, spiritual construct necessary?   Is it even possible?

Ex: the dispute between religious fundamentalists and others on what will be
taught about evolution in the United States.   Is Darwin's theory a fantasy or
do we have scientific proof?   (I think we do).   What to do then about the s
lippery argument of "Intelligent design" and what will be taught in our
schools?

That brings me back to the issue of consciousness, (the role of the ego,
shadow, etc.), the concepts of selfhood and a mass of other considerations which
roil our human relationships.

Which leads me to the despairing question:   Is peace even possible??   Are
we wasting our time talking about it or even trying to   practice it?   If so,
what should we be practicing instead?   Maybe tolerance with majority power,
the rule of law, legal structures, prisons for lawbreakers, etc., is the best
we can do in our current state of conscious evolution and we'd best be focusing
on raising our own individual consciousness, tolerance level and inner
beingness and forget about peace as a target.   Peace will emerge when we emerge
into a different state of being.   Radical thought.

These would be my reflections if I were there.

Paul Everett

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