Martin Luther King, Jr's Words of Peace
A few years ago, I stood at the base of the Martin Luther King, Jr. statue in Washington, DC and looked up at the towering figure you see above.
A flood of emotions came over me as I tried to imagine the life he led, the sacrifices he made and his dedication to justice through peaceful means.
This was a man dedicated to love.
His quote about peace is especially meaningful to me. As a serious student of A Course in Miracles, I believe the way to create a more peaceful world, is for each of us to to cultivate inner peace.
I love a quote from the Course that says, "Peace is stronger than war because it heals."
Let's dedicate this year to peace. Our purpose can be to nurture our own inner peace that then radiates to our families, communities and throughout our world. Let's allow peace to heal us.
Let's allow peace to be our goal, our path and our state of being.
Choosing Love in Difficult Situations
I wish it was easy for me to choose love in every life situation. It’s not. Sometimes I want to avoid a difficult conversation or pretend I don’t get scared when I hear disturbing news. Even with a consistent spiritual practice, I can still get triggered by a harsh comment, chaotic world event or when faced with a difficult decision.
After practicing degrees of avoidance, dodging, pretending and the occasional “forgetting” for decades, I’ve remembered the truth. All these tactics are simply an ego dance that keep me feeling constrained, stressed, uncomfortable and in conflict.
The truth is equally simple.
Every time I go within and ask Love for guidance on a specific issue or ask for help to react from love instead of fear, something miraculous happens.
There’s a shift.
Sometimes subtle, sometimes more pronounced but a definite shift to a feeling of peace. The shift is physical, mental, and emotional. My shoulders relax, the knot in my stomach...
Freedom Through Inner Peace
“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”
Viktor E. Frankl
This week my country celebrates July 4th as Independence Day. The holiday marks the ratification of the Declaration of Independence by the 1776 Second Continental Congress when my forefathers declared our freedom from Great Britain.
While the last few years have been cited as the reason many in America feel oppressed, in truth, significant swaths of our population have never been free. At least not like it was described in the history books I studied as a kid.
I’ve been thinking a lot about freedom. And who, what or in what circumstances I truly feel free.
I realized something.
My freedom comes from an inner sense of peace. While laws, ordinances and Supreme Court rulings can restrict my actions, movements and outside choices, my freedom lies in my ability to choose my response. As...