Peace starts within you

You have the power to create peace in your world.

Perhaps you don’t think that you have any power when it comes to making peace happen in your lifetime, but you do, and it all begins within you. How does it work? It begins with the energy you choose to bring along.

You already know that you are affected by the energy of other human beings, both positively and negatively. What other people choose to bring with them, will affect the environment you are in.

If someone comes in with a happy good attitude, and a big hello for you, that is very different than someone else who chooses to come in that day with a nasty attitude and nothing good to say to anyone. Who would you rather work with?

As it is within you, so it will be out in your world.

If you decide to be conscious of your own energy and what it is you are bringing with you everywhere you go, you’ll become aware of how even tiny choices that seem insignificant, are profound. Peace really does begin with one human being, and it can spread like wildfire.

“Ultimately, we have just one moral duty: to reclaim large areas of peace in ourselves, more and more peace, and to reflect it towards others. And the more peace there is in us, the more peace there will also be in our troubled world.” -Etty Hillesum

If you need a few more examples of this power you already possess, think of how you are affected by the actions of strangers. A smile from someone you’ve never met can go a long way to helping you remember you are part of something larger. A hello can go a long way to creating peace.

This means say hello to the people you meet as you go about your day.

Ask the cashier how she is doing, say hello to the man who delivers the mail, greet the people in your neighborhood, even if you don’t know them personally. Communicate with the humans you see in the world. Wars happen when we forget that we are all here together, and it’s perfect that we are.

It’s when we forget that other people have many of the same concerns and cares we have, that we can feel like it’s an “us against them” kind of world. This is how war begins. If we are us and they are them, they are not like us. So they must be wrong, and we must fight them – to prove what exactly? How very accustomed we have all become, over many many lifetimes, to the existence of war. War is a given, daily, constant in our lifetimes. Each of us is affected by its existence; every country on this planet is affected.

We are not a collection of borders, countries, and ‘other’, but a planet with many beings.

A small planet, when it comes down to it. Anything one of us chooses to have or do or become, will affect many other beings. Even if you don’t live in a war zone, you are still handling the energy of the existence of war. War cannot exist without human beings to give it life.

You can choose to wage peace, by having a peace consciousness. We can create this energy in our world, by beginning within ourselves. You can start your very own department of peace, by becoming peace. Your peaceful efforts will pay off as others match to your choice.

“As the War Office of the United States was established in a time of peace, it is equally reasonable that a Peace Office should be established in a time of War.” ~Benjamin Rush, Founding Father

• ©Kris Cahill
  Image @Morguefile