Planting Seeds of Peace

It is so hard, and maybe even useless, to try to make sense of the violence and tragedy that we face daily on this planet. When children are killed by guns, swept away by tsunamis or die of cancer in our neighbors arms we are pained to the core. The feelings of grief, anger and fear can be all encompassing.

What to do with those overwhelming feelings of sadness, horror, fear and despair? I personally look to the writings of Thich Nhat Hanh. I can relate easily to the relationship of mother and baby he often uses as a metaphor. Thich Nhat Hanh says that intense feelings need to be embraced, like a mother would embrace a crying baby. We first need to allow ourselves to experience our emotions, even negative ones—feel, smell, see and taste them—and then we must hold them closely and try to understand them.

After our initial emotional reaction, we need quiet moments in the darkness to rock and be with our baby (our anger, sadness, fear) and try our best to see calmly how we might act to relieve the suffering, both our own and that of others. Once we see the need clearly, we will know just what action we should take to help at that moment.

I know that for myself, I need to keep media input to a minimum during times of tragedy. I try my best to seek out intelligent information, without images, and take some quiet time alone to try to process.

Two things keep coming up for me. First is Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings of mindfulness and that “Peace is Every Step.” And second, a song that one of our Roots & Shoots teachers taught everyone for our International Day of Peace celebration back in September. The chorus is:

I am planting seeds of peace in my heart
I am planting seeds of peace in my heart
And as they grow, I’ll take them everywhere I go
I am planting seeds of peace in my heart

Very simple and very true. I need simple and true at times like this.

As Ghandi has said so beautifully, “We must be the change we wish to see in the world.” On a personal level, we will all learn from this tragedy, and we must not forget those lessons. We must remember that planting and nurturing seeds of peace and love starts first with us— and that nurturing those seeds takes daily care, observation and understanding.

What are those seeds for you? For me each time I take a walk in nature with someone I love, a seed of peace and love is planted. When I succeed in speaking truthfully and with care and understanding, seeds are planted within me and in others. When I learn from my many mistakes and failures, and then transform how I act, seeds grow.

Surrounding ourselves with others who understand us and nurture us and our children will build a community of peace—little by little—with love, compassion and understanding.

If we start with small seeds of peace, we can reap their benefits in times of tragedy: we can come back to that nurturing for ourselves, to relieve our own and others’ suffering. We can focus on the courage that humans show, even in times of tragedy, to lift our hearts and give us hope. We can transform our fear and despair into action, like composting turns kitchen scraps into fresh nurturing soil for a garden.

It is in the daily caring and planting of seeds of peace and love that we model a way of life for our children. It is those seeds of peace and love that we planted throughout our lives that we look to now in times like this, and will search out to aid us during our own very personal tragedies throughout life.

© Susan Caruso and Sunflower Creative Arts
Photos © Jaime Greenberg, Haidor Truu and Sunflower Creative Arts