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

Judy D. Spady ejespady at mydurango.net
Wed Dec 8 09:57:40 PST 2004


I am new to this list but had to respond to this one...

I wholeheartedly agree with Paul's thoughts at the end of his message.  I do not think peace is possible (realistically).  Whenver there are humans involved, there will be personality differences and when those differences become so vastly opposite, war breaks out.  I believe that with a deeper understanding of our personality differences and acknowledging that no 'personality type' is truly 'right' will move us towards peacefulness.  I completely agree with Paul's statement - "we'd best be focusing on raising our own individual consciousness, tolerance level and inner beingness and forget about peace as a target."  If/when everyone begins focusing on their own choices in life instead of looking to blame others, we might get somewhere........but unfortunately, I doubt that will ever happen.

Judy Spady
Experiential Learning for Impact
Bayfield, Colorado

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: EVERETT813 at aol.com 
  To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU 
  Sent: Sunday, December 05, 2004 12:09 PM
  Subject: Re: Practice of Peace in Sweden--A reflection on the Issue


  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 slippery 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 * * ========================================================== OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU ------------------------------ To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of oslist at listserv.boisestate.edu: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs: http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist

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