Purpose for our Pages and Our Vision

Danaan Paary in his book, "Warriors of the Heart" speaks of the controversy that arose when he gave a lecture titled "No More Gandhis". People said, "What do you mean, no more Gandhis? That's exactly what we need - someone to lead us, to inspire us, to show us the way". His response was that the time was passing wherein we could rely on superheros to do do it for us. He states:

The old way, that of setting up and following some charismatic leader and giving our power away to him or her, then blaming them for our faults, is no longer appropriate. There is a new way pushing on us, a way that is congruent with our evolution into the 21st century.

That new way is for you and me and thousands of us to free the Gandhi that lives within our own heart. That new way is to find the courage to unlock the Martin Luther King inside each of us; to give birth to the Mother Theresa that is in each of our beings and to live that consciousness in our daily lives.

The answer then to the question, "Where are our new heros?" is "YOU are hero and you and you and me and thousands of ordinary people just like you and me. These are our new heros, and sheroes too, because the old patriarchal system of macho male war hero worship must change, and is changing, to a new awareness of leadership. This new style of leadership is a shared leadership, a grassroots leadership of thousands of men and women who know who they are, who own their own internal power for right action, and who are directing that power in the service of positive, peace-filled, non-violent human evolution.

You will see many links on our page for peace-related sites. Yes, I believe in the ideal of global peace. I think every man, woman and child in the deepest core of their being truly longs for a world of connection, harmony, understanding, joy, love, dignity, abundance, laughter. In 1996, I joined a group of people who collectively declared our vision to be:

We stand for a world transformed through Love.

 We did some community service together. We experienced a ropes course together. We gave and received honest feedback. At times, we cried together. We celebrated life together and did some absolutely outrageous, outlandish things. We admitted our disempowering internal conversations and all those parts of ourselves where we gave away our power. And we faced a choice that each of us faces at every moment: were (are) we willing to give up being right about Our Stories, our Limitations, about how we have been Victimized OR were (are) we willing to let go and forgive ourselves and others. Were (are) we willing to admit our own power and magnificence and stand for what really matters to us, to stand for our Vision, OR were (are) we going to stay in our limiting Comfort Zone with our old interpretations of ourselves and others and silently, spiritually and emotionally die. By the way, I have been clear for many years now that what scares me the most is not dying - but of finding out that I never really lived. So over the course of these months, we were honest with each other. But most importantly, we were honest with ourselves. After spending roughly six months together we all went away for a weekend. We didn't know where we were going. That was all arranged for us. But before we went, we designed some t-shirts. The t-shirts had Marianne Williamson's Our Deepest Fear poem on the back. We also had our vision statement printed on the shirt, along with a saying "Eight is Enough" (there were eight of us in our group). You see, it is often tempting to think that one of us cannot make that much of a difference. But as our leaders and visionaries have always known, if a difference is to be made, is has to begin with one. You will see that many of the poems that my son and I have included on our pages reflect the importance of one person. And we say that yes, one person CAN Make A Difference! Anyway, as far as the weekend, let me just say that once we arrived, we really honored the strength, the power, the beauty, the Love, the humanity that was within each of us. And I say that this strength, power, beauty and Love is within Each and Every One of Us! And I also think that we get to honor, celebrate and enjoy each other more. Lets stop being enrolled in each others pettiness and stories and discover our magnificence instead. One paradox is that WE CAN ONLY SEE IN ANOTHER HUMAN BEING PARTS OF OURSELF. If I am disturbed by Any Person, Place, Thing or Situation, it is important that I ask myself what is the lesson and why am I resisting it? (By the way, we know that WHAT WE RESISTS, PERSISTS. Freedom comes through Surrender!) And it is often easier for many of us to admit our seeming weaknesses than it is to admit our strengths. Why? Because we know that if we really get how powerful we really are we might be challenged to PLAY A BIGGER GAME! And of course, this is scary to Mind, to Ego, to whatever label you want to use to that part of ourselves that is so terrified of dying that we will stop living in order to avoid having it die.

In this group, I was taught that THERE IS NO HOPE! I cannot play safely enough to avoid the fact that one day, my friends and members of my family will gather together at my grave, cry a little, say how nice of a person I was, and then you know what? They'll probably all get into their cars and GO TO LUNCH! And that will be that! The point is: THERE IS ONLY NOW! And I cannot take anything with me when its my time to go. All I can do is leave my legacy behind. Did I bring smiles into this World or did I bring tears? Did I take or did I give? Did I play the Game of Life TO WIN or did I Play a Game in Life called PLAYING NOT TO LOSE?

There is another point I would like to make about fear. And that is that I hear people say that faith is the absence of Fear. I have been taught that the more alive I am and the bigger the risks that I am taking, the more fear I get to experience. I will experience fear as long as I have an ego that is invested in my survival. The question is, "Do I let my Fear Stop Me?". The challenge in life is not for me to avoid fear. The challenge is how can we transform our fear, how can we alter our relationship with fear, how can we act in spite of the fear? I suggest that the bigger the game you are playing in life, the more fear you come up against. So, hey, I feel fear! GREAT! That simply means that I am Alive. And that's all it means!

Some of us think that life is so filled with meaning. Perhaps it is. Perhaps not. We have thousands of people who have turned away from God because they blame God for war, for disabilities and birth defects, for deaths, for failed marriages, for bankruptcies, for injustice, for disappointing love affairs that never came about. And some of us think that God had master-minded every experience in our life so that we will get a lesson. Well, what if there is no inherent purpose for the tragedies in this life? What if it just is? And what if we acknowledge that it is actually God's grace that gets us moving again; that it is God's grace that gets people whose houses have just flooded to build new ones; that it is God's grace that permits to risk our Heart again and again even though we have been hurt in the past.

I have one greatest desire. I see that people are living in crowded spaces; people fight over parking spots; people are filled with such a sense of there's not enough to go around so I better get mine while I can. And yet people are so lonely; we often feel so lonely; and we think that WE DON'T MATTER! My desire is for all of us to get that we DO MATTER. And we don't need to bully one another in order to be heard. Facing despair with more despair is not the solution. We see this in the problem of the pro-life/pro-choice issue. Its easy to be judgmental of another and to be self-righteous, angrily promoting one's own beliefs and not taking personal responsibility for the conditions in our World. We say, "it's their fault". By the way, I've been taught that whenever I point a finger, I have three more pointing back at me. And there isn't a "they out there" somewhere. We are them! We are the World! So what would be possible if we took the time to hear one another and practice compassion instead of being stuck in one's position, being committed to Being Right, Looking Good, Being in Control, and Avoiding Pain? Could we then perhaps collectively find a solution? I don't know. But I bet that the quality and quantity of the creative flow of ideas that is generated in an environment of tolerance and compassion is greater than that which is generated in an environment of intolerance and hatred.

I started out talking about my ideal of World Peace. And I want to clarify my thoughts on this. And I am open to hearing what you have to say. You see, although I think the ideal is obviously World Peace, I don't think we as a People are there yet. Based on the results in our Global Community, we are not. And I don't believe in oppression of people. I believe that as long as there is oppression, as long as people misunderstand their God-given, natural Power, as long as people confuse Power with Control, as long as people suspect that their Power is derived from Controlling Others, as long as people refuse to place the welfare of humanity and our Planet above their own desire to BE RIGHT, we will have war. And I want to personally thank the Men and Women in this nation and others for choosing to take a stand and die in the Pursuit of Peace, Liberty and Happiness for all. I want to thank each man and woman that sat in the desert during the Gulf War; I want to thank those bright, young and most likely naive young people who enlist in the Armed Services each year. I want to thank all those leaders whose shoulders we sit on. I believe in Positive Committed Action. I don't believe that sitting in rooms with burning candles and incense and chanting a few mantras for World Peace is going to make as much of a difference as each of us looking at our own lives and seeing where we can create peace in our families, in our work places, in our communities. You see, if IT'S TO BE, IT'S UP TO ME and to each and every one of us. Peace gets to begin at home and in our Hearts.

In closing, let me share that my son and I recently attended a Family Training. One of the assignments we were given for homework was to write a mission statement. We wrote:

We are a joyful, playful and abundant family. We commit to being and creating miracles - for ourselves and others. We stand for a world where people can laugh, sing, cry, dance and be themselves and a world where there is an abundance of unconditional love, forgiveness, joy, passion, beauty, wonder, and respect for all living things.

Isn't this a powerful stand for a ten/eleven-year old child to choose? Of course, most times he is more interested in video games, girls and making sure he gets his allowance. I now invite each of you to share with me your stand, your vision, your purpose. You can sign it in the Guest Book if you choose to share it. But more importantly, I invite you to honestly ask yourself what is your vision. Each day (really, each moment) we get another chance at this thing called life. No matter where you have been in your life, no matter what obstacles you've come up against, no matter what mistakes you think you may have made in the past, you get to choose again! So start now with a new or renewed vision, sense of purpose and commitment. We all do matter.

A small boy lived by the ocean. He loved the creatures of the sea, especially the starfish, and spent much of his time exploring the seashore. One day he learned there would be a minus tide that would leave the starfish stranded on the sand.

The day of the tide, he went down to the beach and began picking up stranded starfish and throwing them back into the sea. An elderly man who lived next door came down to the beach to see what he was doing. "I'm saving the starfish," the boy proudly declared.

When the neighbor saw all of the stranded starfish, he shook his head and said, "I'm sorry to disappoint you young man, but if you look down the beach one way, there are stranded starfish as far as the eye can see. And if you look down the beach the other way, it's the same. One little boy like you isn't going to make much of a difference."

The boy thought about this for a moment. Then he reached his small hand down to the sand, picked up a starfish, tossed it out into the ocean and said, "I sure made a difference for that one."