30 Days of Forgiveness - Day 8 - Wisdom from Gill Hicks

-


 "The cycle of revenge has to stop and it has to stop with me." --Gill Hicks, who was injured in the July 7, 2005 London bombings.

I have always been inspired by people who can forgive large hurts - rape, murder, genocide - while I struggle with the everyday things that happen to most of us.

Gill Hicks is one of those people who have taken something huge and horrific and turned it into something hopeful and positive.

After being severely injured (both her legs had to be amputated below the knee) in the London bombings of 2005, she founded the non-profit M.A.D. for Peace, which believes that empathy is the foundation for a sustainable peace and strives to create empathetic communities. 

The cycle of revenge can stop with each of us when we choose empathy and forgiveness over revenge and bring that empathy into our communities every day.

World peace starts with inner peace. World peace starts with each of us. World peace starts now.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Wisdom from Raul Julia

-
"...[L]ife itself is a meditation."  --Raul Julia I have always loved Raul Julia, since I first saw him as the sensitive married man having sexual tension with Susan Sarandon while solving a murder in "Compromising Positions" (the cast of which also included the always entertaining Judith Ivey - I love her voice and demeanor so much I think I could watch her in anything). He went on to play defense attorney Sandy Stern in "Presumed Innocent" and of course the beloved patriarch Gomez Addams in "The Addams Family."  His was one the first celebrity deaths - in 1994 - to really effect me. He always seemed to have an undefinably quiet strength and grace. I get it now - he saw his life as a meditation - and that makes all the difference.  I hope someday to be remembered for my quiet grace and thanks to Raul I have one more clue about how to do that. Thanks Raul. For everything.
Read more

Quote of the Week - May 21, 2012 - What happens for one...

-
“On this earth we are connected one to another....to another....to another....to another...to another....to another....to another...such that whatever happens to one of happens to all of us.” -- Anna Grossnickle Hines from her book, "Peaceful Pieces" This is a poem called "Dominoes" that my younger son's class read last week on Friday for " Poetry Aloud ." They read it together as a class, one child starting and each child in turn saying "to another," "to another," "to another..." As I listened, the poem came alive for me. The idea of the poem came alive for me. I saw once again that we are all connected, we are all One and that whatever happens for one of us happens to all of us. Did you notice the Freudian slip there? I wrote, "whatever happens for one of us happens to all of us,"  when what I meant to write was, "whatever happens to one of us happens to all of us." But both are equally tr
Read more

28 Days of Kindness: Day 25

-
Every generation is a life-and-death struggle between wisdom and ignorance,  and there is no guarantees wisdom is going to win.  We have to try to be as human as we can be,  and as kind as we can be, and detach from our need for results.  -- Peter Coyote  ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ Be as human as you can be. Practice kindness. 28 Days of Kindness .
Read more