The BeZine

Volume 9 Summer 2022 Issue 2

Waging Peace

balancing personal & global crises & needs

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Cover art: Extinction
Digital Art
©2022 Dean Pasch

Introduction

Waging Peace: balancing personal & global crises & needs

“We can never obtain
peace in the outer world
until we make peace
with ourselves…”

Not for more than a generation has the word ‘Peace’ held so much meaning and poignancy as it does now. The unjustified and inhumane attack by massed Russian Military Forces on Ukraine in February this year, is the largest scale act of aggression by any European country since Nazi Germany started its Blitzkrieg on Europe in 1939…and it does feel like the Russians have taken a leaf out of the Nazi book of waging war whilst making it look like a mercy mission.

Fear and anxiety are often referred to by Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, as the source of all human conflict. They lead to a defensive attitude, deception, division, jealousy, greed, territorial conflict ultimately the relentless pursuit of wealth and power.

When the individual pursuit of wealth engages with other individuals in that pursuit and is scaled to an organisational and political level, then a culture develops, which engages with and infuses itself into a nation’s conscience on a social, cultural and even religious level to help achieve political approval. When this point is reached, national borders can no longer contain our ambitions.

It feels awkward to admit that, as a member of the human race, but I understand that desire to keep on gaining money and all that it can buy, like the very first and most important task of securing the first roof over your head, a dry and warm space to call your own home, followed by some material comforts. In certain parts of the world, the so called First World, symbols of status will often start at a very much more humble level, then follow in all their variety. The means of securing them will then inevitably be needed and so on and so relentlessly forth we go. The more of all these things we have, the more we feel entitled to, the more we want. The more we have, the more we fear its loss. The more threatened we feel for the loss of these things, the greater the insecurity, the greater our anxiety, the greater we feel threatened, the greater the risk of extreme reactions.

“People exist to be loved
Objects exist to be used.
The World is in chaos
…because these things
are the other way round.”

In the mind of an independent individual this cycle of cause and effect will eventually give rise to conflict. If it occurs in the mind of an already powerful political leader, then it has the potential to cause conflict on a massive scale. Whether we like it or not, we are all to a greater or lesser extent bound into this human process, because we are too small as individuals and dependant on the authorities that rule…until we discover the way to influence by ‘waging’ peace on a irresistible scale.

There can be no true peace in the minds of those, who have allowed themselves to be caught up in this vicious circle of cause and effect, of being driven by the desire for things and led by the providers of things…not love.

“If you wish
to experience peace,
provide peace
for another…”

The challenge we face with our desire for peace in the World is that it has at its root the state of peace inside our minds. Seeking happiness may seem like a worth while cause, but it isn’t a guarantee of a peaceful life. Only by finding peace inside ourself, inside our unique and individual selves, in a way that will preserve our ego and nourish our soul, would you be able to contribute to peace for others. We are all trying every day, but it is always made the more difficult by the actions of those, whose goals may conflict with our own, who do things outside our control that make us uncomfortable, unhappy and stressed, that, worst of all, make us feel angry!

Waging Peace—what we are striving to do right now at the BeZine – will speak to you of all this, but so much better. Such thoughts, writings, works of art and performance have been telling the same stories, in all their different ways, throughout the history of humanity.

If you think we as individuals can make no difference to the huge challenges that face us, even if only by allowing the thoughts of others to help you, I heartily recommend you to take in the many perspectives that our contemporary creative and talented poets, writers and artistic contributors can cast on the way of the human world and the many variety of ways in which they find they can commit their thoughts to the greatest challenges that humanity faces.

“If you think you are
too small to make a difference
try sleeping with a mosquito
in the room…”

All quotations: Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

— John Anstie, Associate Editor