World’s Potluck
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Tag Archives: peace
I can choose…
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Smile Experiment
“And Love is reflected in love…”
– Mary Baker Eddy
I’ve been wanting to share this experience, but I haven’t been sure how to go about it without looking like I am full of myself or something. So maybe I should start this post in this way: I am nothing special to look at – I am a stubby middle-aged woman, generally seen in schleppy clothes and walking shoes when I’m out running errands. I might have been called “pretty” when I was younger – but these days I look more like Cinderella’s fairy godmother than Cinderella. And I’m cool with that.
So a few months ago, on my lunch break at work, I put on my old walking shoes and ambled down into town in quest of something to eat. I don’t remember now what I was thinking about as I was walking, but it must have been something happy because I, apparently, had a smile on my face. A young man, approaching from the other direction, said he’d seen the smile on my face from a block away. He said he’d felt himself pulled to me so he could wish me a good day and let me know that my smile had put him in a good mood.
Isn’t that neat? 🙂
I thought of that experience again last week when I was grocery-shopping at the local supermarket. I was in a funk when I began my shopping. I no longer recall what had put me in this funk, but I remember feeling really tired and cranky. Coincidentally, everyone else I encountered seemed to be feeling less than jolly, too. As I rounded an aisle I saw a woman whose face looked particularly drawn and tired. My heart went out to her and I found myself summoning a smile for her. As soon as she saw my smile, she returned a dazzling one back to me. I could see the lines on her face literally lifting in front of my eyes. I felt the lines on my own face lifting, too.
I still had the smile on my face when a man turned his cart into my aisle and glanced my direction. And now HIS face turned up into a friendly grin. I decided to keep the smile on my face as I continued with my shopping – sort of conducting an informal experiment. And, sure enough, just as I had predicted would happen, every single person I encountered whilst wearing my smile, smiled back at me in a friendly, cheerful way. It was like magic.
I think people WANT to be nice to each other, you know. I think they’re looking for an opportunity to smile at other people and be kind to them – even stubby, middle-aged ladies.
But I should probably do a lot more smile experimentation to make sure my hypothesis is correct, right? 🙂
“Happiness is spiritual, born of Truth and Love. It is unselfish; therefore it cannot exist alone, but requires all mankind to share it.”
– Mary Baker Eddy
Groucho Karen
Peace
Earlier this week – at the end of a long, dark day – I looked out the window and saw this – a blessing, a promise, a symbol of diversity, a symbol of peace and hope. I really needed this right then…
Peace.
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below…
– John McRae
(Originally published on this blog on October 18, 2014)
Saw the movie Fury last night. Really powerful film. Great acting. Beyond gritty. If ever a war movie was an anti-war movie, this one is it.
I woke up this morning with scenes from the movie playing through my head – scenes of death and destruction, blood and cruelty, courage and war-honor. And, as I processed it all, two trains of thought emerged from the smoke.
One of the trains took me to a place of compassion and empathy for the soldiers in every time and every nation who have felt voluntarily compelled, or been drafted, to take up weapons and march to war. It occurred to me that if I had been a soldier watching that movie I might feel a kind of relief in the knowledge that I wasn’t alone – that the “reality” of war is a shared burden of responsibility, memories, and pain by all who’ve lived it.
The other train of thought took me to this place:War has become antiquated. There are no more lessons to be learned from it. It is time for civilization to move on.
Some may say that the cycle of War is never-ending and unstoppable, but I do not agree. Cycles DO stop. I believe there is a natural law – a law of God (Love, Truth, Life) – that pushes mankind towards progress. In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (the textbook for Christian Science) Mary Baker Eddy writes: “…progress is the law of God, whose law demands of us only what we can certainly fulfil.”
We’re surrounded by signs of progress, aren’t we? For all that we are bombarded with news of bigotry, sexism, racism, carelessness, greed, thievery, and murder – there is good going on all around us, too – signs of a mental stirring, or what Mary Baker Eddy would call a “chemicalization of thought” that is moving mankind towards decency. When we hear about slavery, racism, sexism, and bigotry – most of us in the United States no longer find these things acceptable – huge progress from just 150 years ago when slavery was still a part of our nation’s culture, or just 96 years ago (in my dad’s lifetime!) when women didn’t have the right to vote or run for public office. .
And I believe that progress will bring an end to the cycle of War, too. I believe that our world will find peace. I hope it will be soon.
“…and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”
– Isaiah 2:4
“Love is the Liberator”
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Universal Love…
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Karen’s Doodle
Years ago, when I taught a Peace unit, I’d ask my students at the beginning of the unit: “What IS peace?” and then I’d ask them to draw pictures of what peace looks like for them.
I’ve been puttering around on pixlr.com the last couple days – doodling pictures – and when I finished this doodle I remembered my old Peace unit, and thought, “This is what peace looks like for me!”
“Be still, and know that Love is God.”
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T’was Two Weeks Afore Christmas
T’was Two Weeks Afore Christmas
T’was two weeks afore Christmas and all through Eff Bee
not a creature was stirring – not a she, he, or me
We were prostrate and spent from the holiday bustle
not a twitch could be seen from the teeniest muscle.
We lay all unblinking in our respective beds
while visions of gift-wrapping swirled through our heads
And clad in our jammies and our way cool madcaps
we had the vague hopeful hope our bodies would take naps.
Holiday jangles and jingles pinged through our brains –
Presley, Crosby, and Mathis taking us down memory lanes –
and would we remember every member to be gifted?
We mentally went through our lists, hoping none were omitted.
There were homes to be decorated and cards to be sent,
parties, caroling, and cookie-making, and we hadn’t made a dent.
But with a collective sigh we remembered there and then
that it’s really about good will to all creatures, women, and men.
And so our thoughts finally settled and our bodies relaxed
as we thought of those we love and a world festooned in pax.
With our hearts wrapped in kindness and the world as our ‘hood
We’re all brethren and sistren – and verily, it’s all good!
– Karen Molenaar Terrell, from The Madcap Christian Scientist’s Christmas Book)
photo by Karen Molenaar Terrell
Adventures of the Madcap Christian Scientist 