Sunflower #4: “Making Peace” and Making a Difference
“Even the simplest act, born from love, resonates without limit.” — Sister True Dedication
“Sunflower” posts are to share inspiration about activism. They are to explore our ideals, passions, and motivations.
Like a young sunflower, it is helpful to orient ourselves towards the sun, letting it guide us during hard times of growth. So that when we are grown, we can face proudly east together, to greet the sunrise we know awaits us in the morning. See past Sunflower posts here. Put compassion into action using the Dandelion Report, or Spring Rain posts.
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“Making Peace” by Denise Levertov
A voice from the dark called out, “The poets must give us imagination of peace, to oust the intense, familiar imagination of disaster. Peace, not only the absence of war.” But peace, like a poem, is not there ahead of itself, can't be imagined before it is made, can't be known except in the words of its making, grammar of justice, syntax of mutual aid. A feeling towards it, dimly sensing a rhythm, is all we have until we begin to utter its metaphors, learning them as we speak. A line of peace might appear if we restructured the sentence our lives are making, revoked its reaffirmation of profit and power, questioned our needs, allowed long pauses… A cadence of peace might balance its weight on that different fulcrum; peace, a presence, an energy field more intense than war, might pulse then, stanza by stanza into the world, each act of living one of its words, each word a vibration of light -- facets of the forming crystal.
Making a Difference
The forces in the world feel gigantic right now.
Even the news we read speaks in the terms of thousands, millions, billions, and trillions — numbers so large our minds can hardly visualize them, let alone relate them to the rippling impact felt around the world, and far into the future.
When we are just one person, one perspective, one life — how can we hope to have any influence on the currents of a tidal wave?
Perhaps it is helpful to see that these massive forces are still made up of small parts — a tidal wave is only made of droplets. Countries are built upon the collective agreement of millions of individuals, each with a unique life, each depending on the earth and each other to survive. Movements that span generations are still carried and passed on by the words and hearts of humans. Ideas that have survived thousands of years survive on paper that would not have existed without the sun and rain to grow the trees.
If droplets turn against the flow, the flow slows, or the currents may even shift.
Small things are also interconnected with everything else. Even the bowl of oatmeal and berries I had for breakfast could only exist because of the existence of everything else. The produce was grown on many farms, which required the soil, sun, and rain to be favorable. Many people worked to plan, plant, harvest, transport, display, and sell the produce to me. All of these people exist because of an unbroken chain of ancestors going back thousands of years, all of their teachers, and all the food that they also had to eat to have the energy to make my food.
After eating, this oatmeal becomes a part of me. Without it and other food, I could not have the energy to write these words, to learn about and speak out for the causes I believe in, or to be alive in this moment.
So something as simple a bowl of oatmeal was influenced by everything, and exerts influence on everything— including my activism, and perhaps even the activism of those around me.
So how can we not make a difference? What we do — through our thoughts, words, and actions — is interconnected with the world. Even our smallest actions and thoughts ripple out into the current of current events.
A line of peace might appear if we restructured the sentence our lives are making, revoked its reaffirmation of profit and power, questioned our needs, allowed long pauses…
That is why even something as small as mindful breath, a mindful step, or being present for someone else, can provide the peace and clarity that shifts the current of our life. Shifting the current of our life, unavoidably, impacts the current of our world. Sometimes in small ways, sometimes in big ways, but always completely.
Sister True Dedication says in her wonderful Ted Talk “3 questions to build resilience — and change the world”:
“Even the simplest act, born from love, resonates without limit.”
She also speaks about how awareness of our interconnection, and awareness of the present moment, can be strengthened by something as simple as mindful walking and mindful breathing. And that this awareness, combined with being connected to our deepest intention, can provide us with the resilience and energy needed to change the world.
So please, do not worry if your actions are making a difference in the world. Think about what kind of difference you want to make, and how you can support yourself to do your best in this work.
What poem are you writing, stanza by stanza, every day of your life?
Thank you for being here,
Chris