This blog is to deepen our relationship to one another as a community after spending four-weeks in the Roadmap course together.
In the comment boxes below please reflect on the following questions:
WHAT AM I MOST PASSIONATE ABOUT?
WHERE DOES MY PASSION LIVE ON THE ROADMAP?
Go to the next reflection question
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By: Metta Center
We provide educational resources on the safe and effective use of nonviolence, with the recognition that it’s not about putting the right person in power but awakening the right kind of power in people. We advance a higher image of humankind while empowering people to explore the question: How does nonviolence work, and how can I actively contribute to a happier, more peaceful society?
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Nonviolence Lifeline
A Palestinian’s Journey to Nonviolence
2021 Certificate Program
Cosmic Peaceforce SpaceMeet
Nonviolence Radio April 9, 2021
At this point in my life, I am most passionate about cultivating an intentional, loving, unhurried person & home life while being deeply engaged in working for climate and environmental protection. It is important to me that my home life reflects the vision that motivates my work. To me, this means that clothes hang on the line, that monthly electricity consumption averages less than 150 kWh/mo, natural gas use is low (quantitative goal tbd), consumer items are few, food is primarily organic and local, garden is growing. It also means that I walk or bike to work; find time to meditate; and work in a focused, efficient manner (as opposed to a frenzied, multi-tasking, blur). These passions straddle the interface between climate-environment-vibrant & needs-based economies-person-power portions of the Road Map.
Personally, I’m passionate about responding to life through authentic choices.
In relation to the larger world, what continues to draw my interest is Restorative Circles, which falls in the Democracy/SocialJustice sector, which is somewhat surprising to me since it sounds so dry. From my first exposure, Restorative Circles seemed to me inherently revolutionary–one of those stealth approaches that those invested in the status quo would smash in a nanosecond if they understood its potential. I kept leaking tears as I listened and envisioned and grasped the depth of understanding of human hearts in this vision, the extent of commitment that would be involved to attend to its principles on the ground, and the magnitude of courage required to follow through to its full implications. At the time I judged my appreciation to be “aesthetic,” “esoteric,” and “elitist,” but Dominic Barter wisely told me people tend to find a place to put it into practice. I couldn’t stop describing the process to people I met, and sure enough someone asked whether a conflict that had come up in a local land trust community would be amenable to a Circle. And so I began. I’ve been moving slowly but something continues to push me from inside. More in the space in this website for reporting on how we are deepening our commitments. I should say also, I am no longer willing to work alone, not even tempted to try it. Happily, community support for the facilitators is an intrinsic part of the Restorative Circles process.