“Destruction is not the law of the humans.” ~ Gandhi, Harijan in July 20, 1931
If destruction were the law of humanity, we would not feel remorse or regret when we harm others. Our bodies would not respond to violence with pain and stress reactions but with oxytocin. But that isn’t the case. Why are servicemen and women committing suicide in record numbers, more than even combat deaths? Because consciously harming and killing others is not in our nature. When we commit acts of nonviolence, on the other hand, the opposite occurs: people become stronger; life takes on more concrete meaning; communities grow; and healing happens.
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About Daily Metta
Stephanie Van Hook, the Metta Center’s executive director, launched Daily Metta in 2015 as a way to share Gandhi’s spiritual wisdom and experiments with nonviolence.
Our 2016 Daily Metta continues with Gandhi on weekdays. On weekends, we share videos that complement Michael Nagler’s award-winning book, The Search for a Nonviolent Future: A Promise of Peace for Ourselves, Our Families, and Our World. To help readers engage with the book more deeply, the Metta Center offers a free PDF study guide.
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By: Stephanie Van Hook
Stephanie Van Hook is Executive Director of the Metta Center for Nonviolence.
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Film Screening Thurs. Dec.10
We cannot love our “enemies.”
Can see play out in this presidential election year between narrative and conternarratives,especially in the mainstream media’s attempts to suppress or dismiss counternarrative. Counternarrative delegiitmizes rule of the corporatocracy on it’s way to replacing the colonizing regieme. Watching this play out and wondering if we can do any better than projecting into the future or deconstructing the mainstream’s narrative of the past. What happens now? How do we take part in this change now?