Make a change

September 21st fast approaches,
the day for those of us who believe that there is a better way to make our voices heard, the International Day of Peace was first established by the United Nations in 1981, and inaugurated in 1982. Made official by the UN general assembly in 2001, the International Day of Peace "will serve as a reminder to all peoples that our Organization, with all its limitations, is a living instrument in the service of peace and should serve all of us here within the Organization as a constantly pealing bell reminding us that our permanent commitment, above all interests or differences of any kind, is to peace.  May this Peace Day indeed be a day of peace."

(Quotes excerpted from the United Nations General Assembly Resolution UN/A/RES/36/67)

We look forward to the time when the Power of Love will replace the Love of Power.  Then will our world know the blessings of peace.  ~William Ewart Gladstone

The real differences around the world today are not between Jews and Arabs; Protestants and Catholics; Muslims, Croats, and Serbs.  The real differences are between those who embrace peace and those who would destroy it; between those who look to the future and those who cling to the past; between those who open their arms and those who are determined to clench their fists.  ~William J. Clinton, 1997

I take it that what all men are really after is some form of, perhaps only some formula of, peace.  ~James Conrad

       What can you do, not on the day set forth as a day to recognize peace, but on every day, to bring some tranquility to the space you inhabit? Is that what you choose? Or do you instead choose to turn the power over to our government. Governments no longer hold the power to change. They already have what they want; power, chaos that blinds the people, a constituency so unaware that they allow their freedoms to disappear before their very eyes, all the while ignorant to the fact that these freedoms do not exist at the will of the government, but by our own will. The freedom of speech is not a tool for rulers to wield, nor is it a weapon for "we the people". It simply is, and it is by our very ability to think, and form words. Who are these people who would tell us that it is okay to speak our minds, or to write as we choose to? The Founding Fathers?! Pompous asses! The idea of a Bill of Rights, of needing a Constitution, should be so ridiculous! Who is anyone to tell us that what we are already fully capable of doing is okay? In a perfect world, our freedom would be protected by our own respect for one another, and our respect for an individuals right to be.
War is a construct of a thirst for power. If Power is something you desire so intensely that you will war over it, you cannot handle it anyway. Why is it so far fetched to hope for a global community governed by mutual understanding, by mutual respect. If only materiality, corporate greed and ownership were not so important to so many, perhaps we could exist on sharing alone. Knowledge is the most powerful tool at the disposal of man, and yet is the one most often left, untouched, in the arsenal. We have been tricked into believing that the path to peace is war, and eventual domination. You do not need to live under one idea to live in peace, you only have to respect and appreciate the beauty of diversity.

"Peace is more than the absence of war. It is about transforming our societies and uniting our global community to work together for a more peaceful, just and sustainable world for all." ~ anonymous