A Birthday, a Death, and a Trip to Israel
My crazy road to peace and Divine love.
My fiftieth birthday loomed, and my step-grandmother had died. Two facts that don’t seem much related, and yet…
On a whim, I’d picked up James Twyman’s Emissary of Light. Intrigued by his experience with a group of mystics in Bosnia/Croatia war (Anyone remember that war?), I signed up for his emails.
In 2002, a war in Iraq threatened to erupt. Bush had announced his ‘Axis of Evil’ — Iraq, Iran, North Korea. Here was the sad outcome of 9/11, a list with no country of origin of the terrorists on it. Iraq had oil, and no allies but did have imaginary ‘weapons of mass destruction’. Hey, it was the Middle East. Close enough.
The second intifada of Palestinians against Israel boiled over in 2002. A suicide bomber (one of several that month) killed 30 people during a Passover Seder. In defense, Israel launched “Operation Defense Shield” with sweeping incursions into the West Bank and Palestinian cities and the usual devastating effects.
In other words, that part of the world was again an inferno.
Twyman, along with Greg Braden, and Doreen Virtue, created a worldwide peace meditation. In February 2003, meditators would hold peace and send it to Neve Shalom/Wahat al-Salam, an Israeli village founded by a monk in 1972. Developed as a model of peaceful coexistence, Neve Shalom/Wahat al-Salam is home to 35 Arab and 35 Israeli families.
Jimmy was looking for people to go with him. The group would form an energetic anchor for the meditation. Sort of like a ‘calling in’ force.
WOW. (0) (0)
My 50th fell in February and voila, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. But my bank account and the $2000 trip fee did not match up. Then my grandmother died.
And left me $2000.
Whatever hesitation I’d felt was gone. It was a go for Israel. My friends couldn’t believe it. What are you nuts?! They’re blowing people up.
“I live in New York. I take my life in my hands every time I cross the street. And if I don’t make it back? Hey, I died trying to do something. I can live with that,” (Or not), says I.
The power of this journey hit me the first morning. I woke up at 3AM, not from jet lag, but from sobbing. Tears of desolation. They would not stop. The utter strangeness of this deep emotion was its completely impersonal sensation. It felt like centuries of pain trapped in the land had found an outlet.
Me.
This continued when I slept in Jerusalem. I would go to the mandala Jimmy had created in our meeting room and let it pass through. A few others had the same experience. One sweet woman was so destabilized she had to leave.
A Palestinian, Ibrahim, and Eliayhu, an orthodox Jewish man, provided access to Sheiks, Rabbis, Priests, and even a Bedouin tribe as we traveled to sacred places of all faiths. There were about 40 of us, people of the spiritual, mystical mold, but all down to earth. Though Eliayhu said going places with us was like trying to herd cats.
The trip rolled on and wrapped me in exhaustion. Whenever there was a pause, I had only one thought. Bed. Not that it wasn’t spectacular. Some highlights were dawn at Galilee, meeting the Bedouin people, and the open sincerity of all the leaders. Plus the added bonus of what a friend of mine calls sacred shopping in the West Bank of Jerusalem.
I became friendly with a merchant in the old city who sold used Bedouin robes (One way the Bedouins make money.) and his own jewelry. We would sit, have tea, and talk, as is the custom there.
He revealed to me tearfully on my last day that because of my purchases he could buy presents for his children on Eid al-Adha. How small things can make a big difference. I had not thought about it but intifada = no tourists = no income.
After a week of bonding, our group gathered at the village. We’d attracted other like-minded people along the way, other peace workers. I sat between two of them, two men, a journalist and Bill who teaches the way of peace still.
Jimmy had planned a musical beginning, with people singing, standing, and dancing. My two companions and I remained motionless. It was impossible to move. Not in a panicky, paralyzed way, but in a captured-by-a-feeling way.
I sat immobilized by what I can only describe as… Love but something much more. Deep, clear, a feeling of completeness, without words… the Divine. Participants the world over were sending peace in our direction. It was exquisite.
Could my mornings of tears have been a preparation for this? A clearing of me as well as the land? Feels right, but impossible to say.
In any case, tears again streamed but in joy. I now understand the exaltation and ecstasy spoken about in religious visions. This was not religious but it clearly connected to the Divine.
The men on either side of me were my pillars, my protectors. None of us spoke. When it ended, we smiled at each other and separated quietly.
There’s nothing special about me. You’d have been touched by it too. Hard not to get wet in a waterfall. Trust me, if you look for a way to connect with Divine love, you will find it.
Over 100,000 people had participated. Jimmy got crime statistics for the time surrounding the meditation. The Global Consciousness Project, tracked the meditation and came up with significant findings. Violence had diminished greatly. Not forever and it didn’t stop a war, but noticeably.
You have to start somewhere.
And I now knew something incredibly important and hopeful. The energy of Divine love exists and is always there. And, if we access it, everything changes.
I’d had inklings of this before at ancient sacred sites and particularly after 9/11. When I meditated after the attacks, it was like plugging into a reservoir of love. A reservoir that, alas, went untapped when war became the answer and not the heart.
I always think about Thich Nhat Hanh’s response when someone asked him, “What would you do if you met the terrorists of 9/11?” “I would sit down and listen to them”, he replied.
So now, when violence breaks out, as it has again in Israel, I don’t point fingers. I go within. I send peace. I hold the vision of all living together in respect and understanding.
The roots of the current conflict are deep and complex. I know a bit more than many people about that particular region. I waitressed in an Israeli nightclub and married a Palestinian. (The cook! lol) I would take the other side’s defense in any conversation. A great lesson in how not to be popular!
Conflict or not, I always pay attention to how I am in the world. So easy to go off on someone or something, isn’t it. Feels so justified. Good even. But, in reality, if we took Thay’s advice and listened, nine times out of ten we’d find a mismatch of need, wounding, views and nothing more.
I think I’ll end with Thay.
“We often think of peace as the absence of war, that if powerful countries would reduce their weapon arsenals, we could have peace.
But if we look deeply into the weapons, we see our own minds- our own prejudices, fears, and ignorance. Even if we transport all the bombs to the moon, the roots of war and the roots of bombs are still there, in our hearts and minds, and sooner or later we will make new bombs.
To work for peace is to uproot war from ourselves and from the hearts of men and women. To prepare for war, to give millions of men and women the opportunity to practice killing day and night in their hearts, is to plant millions of seeds of violence, anger, frustration, and fear that will be passed on for generations to come.”
The time: Now. The action: Peace. Let’s all do the best we can. Love and blessings. Namaste.
