Mindful Peacebuilding
Mindful Peacebuilding
peace in ourselves - peace in our communities
peace on our planet
peace in ourselves - peace in our communities
peace on our planet
Engaging Societal Challenges
With The Energy of Mindfulness.
Mindful Peacebuilding is an inclusive welcoming community offering a mindfulness-based approach to co-creating true peace and justice on our planet and in our communities, cultures, societies, and countries. We draw inspiration from the wisdom and compassion teachings of ancestral traditions and contemporary peacemakers such as Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh as well as from young people, elders, and nature. We are open to all who wish to engage societal challenges in a mindful context.
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ACTION: SUPPORT PHOEUN
(to contribute support for Phoeun, click on Donate)
UPDATE JULY 15, 2022 from Jun, MPB/San Quentin Sangha
Dear family, friends and sangha,
It has been an intense week. Phoeun can be deported any day, but it now looks like it might take one week to several weeks for ICE to get the flight arranged. ICE often deports groups of people instead of individuals.
Last night we had a meeting facilitated by Gala King and Rev Deb Lee from Interfaith Movement for Human Integrity to organize a last push for Phoeun. At the Zoom meeting were representatives from Asian Law Caucus (Asians Advancing Justice), CERI (Center for Empowering Refugees and Immigrants), IMMDef (Immigrant Defenders Law Center), Asian Prisoner Support Committee, Phoeun's attorney, Danny Thongsy, Joyce Xi and myself. Together we will launch a last push for Phoeun, a week of action - calls, emails, social media and a rally. Info to come soon.
We have been reaching out to all our contacts and several interviews have happened for Phoeun on the radio and in the press. Phoeun, who is a writer for the San Quentin Newspaper, is writing an OpEd.
Danny and I went shopping for a duffel bag and clothes for Phoeun to take on the flight in case he gets deported. Formerly incarcerated friends donated for clothes and supplies. Danny provided a cell phone and Chanton Bun provided a Chromebook. We had hoped to deliver the bag and visit, but were told that his housing unit just went into quarantine and all visits have stopped. Normally a detainee is allowed one visitor per week. We sent the bag via FedEx to a friend in Bakersfield who will drop it off at Mesa Verde ICE - the electronics have to be hand delivered and logged in.
We've talked to Phoeun many times. He's done several short audio interviews, NBC Bay Area, KTVU, Earhustle (for their social media) and others are scheduled. Danny confirmed tonight that State Assembly member Nancy Skinner will write a support letter! We are still trying to get letters from other elected officials.
Phoeun spent much of today calling people to thank them for their support. He wants you all to know that your support and love keep him strong and moving forward. He asked me to let you know how grateful he is - no matter where he ends up. Phoeun has helped so many people. Even while living this heartbreaking situation, he is thinking of others. love and solidarity, jun
Media Links:
NBC Bay Area: Advocates Fight Former Child Refugee's Deportation to Cambodia After Prison Release
“He shouldn’t be deported because he had already served his time and being deported is basically another life sentence,” said community advocate Somdeng Danny Thongsy. “During my time at San Quentin, he actually mentored me a lot and he was one of my facilitators in the trauma therapy class which helped me explore my trauma. And because of that I was able to heal from that.”
KTVU: California man who served 25 years poised to be deported to Cambodia
You's supporters aren't giving up. They're still writing the governor and they're still hoping to change the law. "I'm very hopeful," said Bun from the Asian Law Caucus. "I have to live on hope."
Short Nextshark piece which draws from the NBC story. link: https://news.yahoo.com/gov-newsom-urged-pardon-former-214651209.html
KCBS 1minutes 19 sec: https://www.audacy.com/kcbsradio/news/state/newsom-asked-to-halt-deportation-of-former-child-refugee
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STUDY/ACTION related to Climate/Racial Justice
Summer: second and fourth Mondays (7pmPT/10pmET)
Book: All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis, ed by Ayana Elizabeth Johnson & Katharine K. Wilkinson
LISTENING CIRCLES
first and third Saturdays (2pmPT/5pmET)
Next: August 6, 2022
Listening Circle Links/Offerings
17 July 2022
Seneca Falls Convention
https://www.history.com/topics/womens-rights/the-seneca-falls-convention-video
Nelson Mandela Birthday
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PyfOrbO0xf4
Sojourner Truth (1797-1883): Ain't I A Woman?
Delivered 1851--Women's Rights Convention, Old Stone Church (since demolished), Akron, Ohio
Well, children, where there is so much racket there must be something out of kilter. I think that 'twixt the negroes of the South and the women at the North, all talking about rights, the white men will be in a fix pretty soon. But what's all this here talking about?
That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man - when I could get it - and bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?
Then they talk about this thing in the head; what's this they call it? [member of audience whispers, "intellect"] That's it, honey. What's that got to do with women's rights or negroes' rights? If my cup won't hold but a pint, and yours holds a quart, wouldn't you be mean not to let me have my little half measure full?
Then that little man in black there, he says women can't have as much rights as men, 'cause Christ wasn't a woman! Where did your Christ come from? Where did your Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him.
If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, these women together ought to be able to turn it back , and get it right side up again! And now they is asking to do it, the men better let them.
Obliged to you for hearing me, and now old Sojourner ain't got nothing more to say. [1]
June Listening Circles--Links
Juneteenth Videos/Poetry
POEM—Juneteenth--We Rose by Kristina Kay Robinson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MR3WqYI6wco (3.25)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WH3a_xtjzZg
https://www.juneteenth.com/poetry/
June 21--Summer Solstice
Reading --Solstice by Tess Taylor
June 22--World Rainforest Day - Video - Take a Breath
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RF5FPsYAqxY
Website--https://www.worldrainforestday.org/
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ABOUT MINDFULNESS-BASED PEACEBUILDING
nurture connection and empowerment
engage the challenges of our times
from a heart-mind of love
truly meet this moment
transform what needs to be transformed
give birth to a culture of liberation
grounded in
love, compassion, and kindness
equity, belonging, true justice, true peace
Individual, public and community action
1. Challenge inequity in health, policing, education, housing, criminal justice and other institutions
2. Support local Black-led and Indigenous-led organizations
3. Support local PGM-led organizations
(PGM=People of the Global Majority)
4. Participate in individual and collective healing spaces
Mindfulness-Based Peacebuilding
CREATING TRUE PEACE
The collective is made of the individual, and the individual is made of the collective, and each and every individual has a direct effect on the collective consciousness...Engaged peace workers need to be strong, stable, and genuinely peaceful. Inner balance is crucial for peace work...Of course, you do not have to wait until you achieve perfect peace and harmony before you engage in social action. --Thich Nhat Hanh, Creating True Peace, p 56-59
Mindfulness
in Institutions: Prisons, Families, Schools, Workplaces
VISION: IMAGINE A PEACEFUL, JUST, and BEAUTIFUL WORLD -WHERE PEOPLE . . .
. . . recognize fear and anger, give attention to inner peacemaking: heal emotional wounds from the past, grieve and mourn loss, share dreams
. . . learn ways to recognize, acknowledge, and transform inner suffering, develop the capacity to touch roots of joy in the present, and act from compassion and love
Earth-Holding & Protecting: Addressing Climate Change, Food Security, Access to Clean Water, Compassion for Animals and Plants
VISION: IMAGINE A PEACEFUL, JUST, and BEAUTIFUL WORLD - WHERE PEOPLE. . .
. . . care for and protect animals, plants, and nature, including air, water, and earth
. . . develop the moral and political will and the skillful means to ensure that, while protecting nature and the Earth, the need of all human beings for food, water, security, and other basic needs is met
. . . find ways for all people to participate in decisions which affect their lives
.
Watering Seeds of Justice and Peace: Transforming and Healing Historical
Harm --Touching Our Ancestors and Descendants
VISION: IMAGINE A PEACEFUL, JUST, and BEAUTIFUL WORLD - WHERE PEOPLE . . .
. . recognize, acknowledge and address power and privilege inequities, both historic and current
. . . honor, value, and celebrate cultural and other diversities, human commonality, and individual uniqueness
. . . resolve to learn and practice ways of addressing conflicts creatively and nonviolently
Mindfulness-Based Peacebuilding--2022
Via Zoom
healing, community, and skill-building in these times
mindfulness and loving-kindness meditation
deep listening and sharing from the heart
individual action supported in community
send email to request Zoom Link to:
mindfulpeacebuilding@gmail.com
Silence was meaningful with the Lakota, and their granting a space of silence to the speech-makers and their own moment of silence before talking was done in the practice of true politeness, listening, and regard for the rule, "thought comes before speech." Conversation was never begun at once, nor in a hurried manner. No one was quick with a question, no matter how important, and no one was pressed for an answer. A pause giving time for thought was the truly courteous way of beginning and conducting a conversation. --Luther Standing Bear
Listening Circles: Offerings and Links
For Meditations, Quotes, Songs, Stories
from the Listening Circles, Click: Resources
***********************************ONGOING
Racial Equity Practice
Engaging Current Challenges
Healing Ourselves, Healing Our Ancestors
San Quentin State Penitentiary
OrigamiClasses, Re-Entry Support
Annual Day Of Peace Support
Caring for The Earth
Addressing the Challenge of Climate Change
Mindfulness Practice
at Mariposa Institute, Ukiah, CA
Co-Hosted with SugarPlum Sangha
Mindful Peacebuilding
Through Music and Other Arts
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GIFT ECONOMICS
FINANCIAL CONTRIBUTIONS ARE WELCOME
DONATE to Mindful Peacebuilding on this website or mail a check to MPB, PO Box 5612, Elmwood Station, Berkeley CA 94705. All donations are welcome, and tax-deductible.
MPB is a volunteer organization/community.
Contributions support programs .
- Mindful Prison Action: Support at San Quentin Penitentiary includes weekly origami classes, Annual Day of Peace, Post-Release Emergency Fund
- Healing Historical Harm 1) Classes and book and discussion groups focused on white awareness of privilege and power 2) Roots Retreats 3) Inclusivity Library for Children and Adults 4) Multicultural Skillbuilding 4) Community Resilience Model for Transforming Collective Trauma
- Earth Awareness and Protection: Addressing Climate Change
- Creative Arts - Poetry, Music and other creative arts
- Community Service/Public Presence/Action Alerts
- Listening Circles, Mindful Holiday Gatherings, Mindfulness Retreats
Mindful Peacebuilding Through The Arts
Origami and Paintings Made By Men At San Quentin
Origami made by men at San Quentin was shown at the Cherry Blossom Festival in San Francisco. Beautiful to see! The origami was made in a class supported in part by Mindful Peacebuilding and taught by Mindful Peacebuilding volunteer Jun Hamamoto.
Paintings made by men at San Quentin for the Annual Day of Peace inside San Quentin have been donated to Mindful Peacebuilding. Proceeds from sale of the paintings are donated back to the San Quentin Annual Day of Peace project. Information: mindfulpeacebuilding@gmail.com.
ORIGAMI CLASS AT SAN QUENTIN
PARTICIPANTS SPEAK OUT
"Why I enjoy origami: It aligns my heart and mind with my actions and takes me into another space and time."
"Why Origami: Lets me touch a certain innocence I haven't felt since childhood."
"Origami help me connect with others and my Roots."
"When I fold papers, my mind folds. It creases away the wrinkles of my day."
"I am very honor to be a part of Cherry Blossom Festival. Never in my life I would have thought this could happen. Thank you so much."
ORIGAMI CLASS AT SAN QUENTIN
GROUP PROJECT
"Origami calms me. I'm at peace. I feel good when I complete an object."
"I feel very relaxed and peaceful when I am folding origami."
"I enjoy origami because it puts a smile on faces. I feel at ease and happy when I do origami."
PAINTINGS FROM SAN QUENTIN
ANNUAL DAY OF PEACE
"Restorative Justice is taking the blinders off the Lady of Equality - balancing the scales and bringing healing to offenders and victims." --FT (Restorative Justice)
"I'm thankful for the opportunity to be a part of something like this. In a situation where my ability to be an instrument of peace is limited, I'm grateful for any opportunity like this and I'm always going to make every chance count."--PM
(ROOTS Program--Restoring Our True Selves)
"Light always shines brightest in the darkness. Meditation and Contemplative Prayer are the only things that get me through the week."--PS (Centering Prayer)
SAN QUENTIN DAY OF PEACE
"Peace in prison is a rare thing but peace within oneself is rarer. I am happy I've found mine through programs and art."--TW
Roots Retreats
2017, July
Manzanar Internment Camp, CA
2016, May
New Orleans, LA
Whitney Plantation - The Story of Slavery
Roots Retreat, May 8-13, 2016
Six Mindful Peacebuilding friends from the San Francisco Bay Area co-created a pilot Roots Retreat for five days in May, 2016, in New Orleans. Our intention: to honor the ancestors at a site of major historical harm and suffering, and through deep looking and deep listening help to open pathways for individual and collective healing, transformation, and compassionate action. We were of African-American, Caribbean-American, Vietnamese, white European Jewish, and white Northern European ancestry.
As we grounded our practice in sitting and walking meditation, we offered ourselves and our ancestors healing energy at the Whitney Plantation, the first plantation in the United States to focus on the legacy of slavery (www.whitneyplantation.org); at the Tomb of the Unknown Slave at St Augustine's Church; in the Lower Ninth Ward, where houses are still being restored eleven years after Hurricane Katrina (www.lowernine.org); and in Louis Armstrong Park. And we were fortunate to be invited to sit with two meditation groups and to be joined by Delores Watson, a friend who founded the Flowering Lotus Meditation Center in Magnolia, Mississippi. (www.floweringlotusmeditation.org).
Two retreatants shared their intentions for participating in this retreat:
Devin: My purpose feels truly embodied and bigger than me. I'm not sure how to write or articulate it...I have a sense born of deep listening and looking at what my grand-father taught and instilled in us regarding family and storytelling, and also born of dharma practices in relation to my genealogy work. I feel meant to do it, I feel compelled to do it and it feels deeply ancestral.
A.J.: The question that is alive for me is, how do I as a person descended from slave holders take responsibility to make right the wrongs of yesterday and today? How do I heal my ancestors who enslaved others? What have those of us whose ancestors committed atrocities done to ourselves? To our descendants? To all of humanity? What is needed now? How do I move forward? How do I make repairs?
GOALS & PRINCIPLES
Protect The Earth
Consume Mindfully
Meet Basic Human Needs
Communicate Mindfully
Practice Inclusiveness
Value DiversityDeepen Awareness of Privilege
1. Provide support and training for people who practice mindfulness and wish to engage with societal concerns using mindfulness-based peacebuilding action.
2. Design practices for people who engage in public arena service and action to ground themselves with the energy of mindfulness.
3. Offer opportunities for people who practice mindfulness and mindfulness-based peacebuilding action to share insights, successes, challenges, and resources.
4. Support people who are concerned about issues in our time but do not practice mindfulness and are not yet engaged in mindfulness-based peacebuilding action to articulate their vision and discern a specific next step.
5. Articulate mindfulness-based peacebuilding concepts and skill-building practices as a strong foundation for individual, societal, and cultural healing and transformation.
6. Deepen the capacity for embodying true peace in ourselves, our families, communities, and societies, in the service building true peace on our planet.
"Peace Is Every Breath, Peace Is Every Step"
Breathing In, Aware Of The In-Breath
Breathing Out, Aware of The Out-Breath
1. Peace In Ourselves, Peace On Our Planet
Cultivate peace in ourselves by including in our daily lives practices for contemplation, centering, gratitude, mindfulness, and physical well-being as well as play, fun, humor, the arts.
Support work for peace in the world by embodying the energy of peace in our everyday thoughts, words, and actions. Generate wholesome qualities such as joy, kindness, mindfulness, generosity, ease, and equanimity.
Embody A.J. Muste's reminder that "there is no way to peace, peace is the way" and Thich Nhat Hanh's reminder that "peace in the world begins with peace in oneself."
2. Interbeing (Interdependence)
See that each of us is deeply interconnected with other humans as well as with animals, plants, minerals and the Earth. Seek ways to protect life in all its diversity.
Attend to the dimension beyond words, beyond our individual saves and individual species.
Recognize that harming so-called others with words or actions is to harm our own being, refrain from "othering" through enemy-making language and images.
3. Inclusiveness
Celebrate the diversity of human cultures, plant and animal life on our planet.
Shift from oppressive and exploitative power relationships to more equitable, inclusive and diverse connections in our individual lives and in our societies.
Practice inclusiveness in growing the Mindful Peacebuilding organization communications, actions, structures and dynamics.
4. Positive Approach, Constructive Program
When organizing or participating in action in the public arena, do so with a positive approach and attitude, speaking constructively and creatively.
Take good care of strong emotions: grief, disappointment, resentment, desire for revenge, fear, hatred, rage, anxiety, despair, anger, terror.
Recognize and acknowledge historical and current harmful action. Resolve to take some positive action with love in the direction of transforming historical and current harm.
CORE BELIEFS
1. There is no separation. At a deep level, each human being "inter-is" with the Earth, animals, plants, and other humans.
2. Peace in the world begins with peace in oneself. . . peace in oneself radiates out contributing to peace in the world.
3. The energy of mindfulness, compassion, joy, and inclusiveness is a powerful, effective ground for sustainable and creative peacebuilding.
4. Three essential elements in true peacebuilding practice are diversity, inclusiveness, and work to transform power-over relationships into power-with relationships at all levels.
ONGOING
MIND OF LOVE
AWARENESS, ACCOUNTABILITY, ACTION
RESILIENCE
KINDNESS, COMPASSION, JOY
INCLUSIVITY, BELONGING
CLARITY
SPEAKING FROM THE HEART
LISTENING DEEPLY
INDIVIDUAL AND COLLECTIVE HEALING
CONNECTION, COMMITMENT, COMMUNITY
Racial Justice
Awareness and Action
from: Placemat from (SURJ)--Showing Up For Racial Justice. www.showingupforracialjustice.org
ACTION: Set a chair and a place setting to honor the 1024 people killed by the police in 2015. About 400 of those killed were Black. Many of them were unarmed.
TIPS FOR TALKING TO FAMILIES
Listen mindfully before formulating a thoughtful response
Breathe
Ask questions when people express strong opinions
Affirm Clarify the difference between the good intentions and the impact
Speak from a place of mutual interest, sharing personal experiences and emotions
Accountability Partners
ADDRESSING CLIMATE CHANGE
Aim: create emotionally safe ongoing space to support each other in a common purpose.
Accountability Partners are two or three people who have a similar passion or focus related to mindful peacebuilding, e.g, prison and the criminal justice system, climate change, water concerns, eliminating poverty, immigration., compassion for animals. The partners agree to meet regularly by phone or in person, often once a week possibly once a day, or once a month.
Suggested Format (can be adapted)
1. Greetings. Re-state how time available.
2. Continue with any practice to center mind and body in the present moment, e.g., three breaths, sounding a bell
3. Brief Check-In
4. One person speaks
The listener reflects back what has been heard and receives corrections from the speaker
5. The one who was listener speaks and the practice of reflection back is repeated
6. When the agreed upon time is approached, check in to express gratitude, clear anything that needs clearing, and each person's next steps if they wish.
7. Clarify next meeting time.
Mindfulness-Based Peacebuilding
Deepening Awareness, Building Skills
Recommended:
Louise Diamond's
The Peace Book, 108 Simple Ways To Create A More Peaceful World. participants share their personal challenges and joys related to peacebuilding, as well as challenges related to current events, inspirational stories and information from the media, and visions/action steps.
The Metta Center for NonViolence--NonViolence Training and Education
--Michael Nagler's new book:
The Third Harmony: NonViolence and the New Story of Human Nature
Prison Dharma Practice
Recommended: Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow. Deepen individual and collective awareness of causes and conditions that have given rise to our criminal justice system; and commitment to contribute to positive systemic change.
Racial Justice Awareness & Action Practice
CLASSES
Facilitated by AJ Johnston.
Info: mindfulpeacebuilding@gmail.com
Recommended Texts
1. The Way of Tenderness--Zenju Earthlyn Manuel
2. Mindful of Race--Ruth King
3. Dharma, Color and Culture, ed by Ryomen
4. Radical Dharma--Angel Kyodo Williams
5. My Grandmother's Hands--Resmaa Menakem
And by Robin J. DiAngelo
1) White Fragility
2) What Does it Mean to be White?: Developing White Racial Literacy
ROOTS RETREATS
...offer an opportunity for participants to honor ancestors and descendants
...bear witness to deep historical collective and individual suffering
...heal and transform energy of anxiety, depression, despair, grief, terror, shame, rage, alienation into compassion, courage, commitment, belonging, wisdom
Healing and transformation occur through practice:
...contemplative/meditative silence
...awareness of sensation
...mindfulness-based engaged inquiry and curiosity
... open-hearted listening
...speaking from the heart
...mindful walking in community
...mindful movement, yoga, tai chi
...expressive arts including music, dance, poetry, painting/drawing, collage.
...study of engaged ethical guidelines (5 and 14 precepts)
Retreats are organized for small numbers and locally....
Example:
Local: San Francisco: Mission Delores; Museum of African Diaspora
Regional: Manzanar Internment Camp, California
(site of Japanese internment during World War II)
National:
New Orleans and the Whitney Plantation. . . a unique practice opportunity for bringing mindfulness practice to looking deeply into the legacy of racism in the USA and the continuing effect of individual and collective trauma.
Jewish Women Listening
Weekly Listening Circle of Jewish Women via Zoom
Info: mindfulpeacebuilding@gmail.com
Exploring: What Does it Mean to be Jewish?
includes deep listening and speaking from the heart, training ourselves in compassionate communication with people who hold very different views, inquiring into questions related to healing and transforming individual and collective traumatic experience, influencing US policy towards Israel and Palestine, transforming historical and current anti-Semitism, including diversity of Jewish experience, roots and Identities, e.g. racial, language, class, gender, LGBTQ differences as well as different forms of Judaism eg religious, cultural and secular...
Recommended: www.transcendingjewishtrauma.com
Transforming Trauma
Training and Practice
Community Resilience Model (CRM)
Introductory
6 week Classes
Jo-ann Rosen
Victoria Mausisa
and others
Info: mindfulpeacebuilding@gmail.com
Immigration and Detention
Individual and Small Group Action
Small group visits to Detention Courts, San Francisco
Joining Protests at Detention Center, Richmond CA
Voluntary Action with Tias y Abuelas at Texas Border
Elections 2020
Individual and Small Group Action
Writing postcards--Reclaim Your Vote
Poor People's Campaign
Lisening Circle
Dear Friends: Wow--2020 is over. There is a new president and vice-president. And on the evening before the January 20 inauguration of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, a deeply moving public collective memorial near the Washington Monument honored the more than 400,000 people in the USA who had died from Covid-19 at that time. Now there are more than 550,000 deaths. The ceremony spoke to the hearts of the many more people in the USA and around the world who have experienced great suffering due to the virus.
As we go forth into Spring, 2021, we are grateful for the vaccines now being distributed and look forward to ensuring that the distribution is increasingly equitable. It is very clear that a disproportionate number of Black, Latinx and Indigenous communities continue to be the most severely impacted by the virus, and we have witnessed the extreme police violence on Black bodies, resulting in death.
In the USA, we have seen what some have called the "unraveling" of what had been called democracy. Yet, despite gerrymandering and voter suppression, two new Senators from Georgia were elected in January, 2021. They were both Democrats, giving the Democratic Party control of the Senate committees and scheduling as well as the executive branch.
Then, on January 6, 2020, there was an unprecedented violent attack on the Capitol building, an attack intended to, but failing, to disrupt the formalized counting by members of Congress of the certified Electoral College votes for the new president.
All of this affects us individually and collectively, in our bodies, our spirits, our souls. We may experience our feelings as overwhelming. "This very moment is the perfect teacher," Buddhist teacher Pema Chodren reminds us. How to meet this moment? As we come together in compassion and caring we engage together in affirming life: We grieve. We listen. We support each other. We inspire each other. We act with kindness towards ourselves and in our everyday interactions. We act individually and collectively in the public arena.
ARCHIVE: Listening Circles
"Archive" 2018 - 2020
2020
Dec 31--New Years Eve--108 Bells (4pm-5:30pm PST)
Dec 19--Listening Circle related to Mindful Holidays/Dec Birthdays:
e.g., Winter Solstice, Christmas, Kwanzaa (2pm-4pmPST)
Dec 5--Listening Circle- Remembering Pearl Harbor Day, Chanukah (2pm-4pmPST)
Nov 21--Mindful Holiday: Thanksgiving (2pm-4pmPST)
Nov 14--Kingian Nonviolence with Kazu Haga, founder of East Point Peace Academy, trainer in Kingian NonViolence, and author of Healing Resistance: A Radically Different Response to Harm. Registration info below--East Bay Meditation Center)
Oct 24--Listening Circle/Zoom
Facilitator: KSuzanne
Finger Labyrinth
Mindful Holiday: UN 75th Birthday
Videos--
Indigenous Peoples Day
UN Day, Oct 24
Oct 10--Listening Circle/Zoom
Facilitator: KSuzanne & Lyn
Video
Sept 26--Listening Circle/Zoom
Facilitator: KSuzanne & Lyn
Video
Sept 12--Listening Circle/Zoom
Guest Facilitator: Anna Gilman
Deep Relaxation, focus on bones!
AUG 29-Empowerment Saturday via Zoom
Morning Speaker: Kazu Haga, East Point Peace Academy
Kazu is founder of East Point Peace Academy, trainer in Kingian NonViolence inside and outside of prisons and jails, and author of the Parallax Press book Healing Resistance, A Radically Different Response to Harm. East Point Peace Academy has just received a $300,000 grant! check out eastpointpeace.org
Afternoon Speakers: Encampment for Citizenship
Florencia Ramirez, Margot Gibney, Leticia Gutierrez
Leticia Gutierrez is a Youth Intern with the Encampment
Florencia Ramirez is author of Eat Less Water,
The Solution to Worldwide Water Shortages is in our Kitchens
Margot Gibney is Executive Director of the
Encampment for Citizenship Youth Leadership Program
Mindful Peacebuilding is happy to network with the Encampment for Citizenship, a non-profit organization which focuses on youth leadership, community, and social justice. Residential summer programs with year-round follow-up for young people of widely diverse backgrounds and nations provide young people with a compelling experience in democratic living, with emphasis on critical thinking and social action. This is a transformative experience-- young people become more committed to active citizenship and involvement in their community as justice seekers as they become more informed and sensitive about the key issues of our time. One project of the Encampment, with Florencia Ramirez, is with farmworkers and schools in Ventura County relating to pesticide use.
Saturday Zoom Listening Circles and other Gatherings/2020
Dec 31 (New Years Bells)
Dec 19 (Mindful Holiday)
Dec 5 (Mindful Holiday)
Nov21 Mindful Holiday: Thanksgiving
Nov 7
Oct 10, 24
Sept 12, 26
Aug 8, 22
July 11, 18
June 13, 27
May 16--Creative Arts Sharing
May 9--Longer Check-Ins
April 25--Speaker: Shabana Shabazz, Ramadan
Dedication of the Month (April)
Passover, Easter,
Ramadan, Earth Day
April 18--Creative Arts Sharing
April 11--Listening Circle: Corona Virus
March 28--Listening Circle: Corona Virus
Dedication of the Month:
March: Women's History Month
International Women's Day,
World Water Day, Cesar Chavez Day
IN-PERSON GATHERINGS
Mon Jan 13
vegan/vegetarian potluck
Participatory Workshop
with Rosa Zubizaretta
OMAH (Opening Minds and Hearts)
Skill-building
for Heart-Opening Conversations in 2020
includes Empathy Circles and Dynamic Facilitation
Co-Hosts:
Mindful Peacebuilding and Edwin Rutsch/Empathy Circles
Sat, Jan 11
Guest Shabana Shahbaz from the
Masjid Ar-Rehman Mosque in Richmond, CA
will speak about her life in Pakistan, England and the US,
and her recent Umrah to Mecca in honor of Abraham and Sarah and Ishmael.
Co-Hosts: Mindful Peacebuilding and Jewish Gateways
2019
IN-PERSON GATHERINGS
Tues Dec 31
4pm - 8pm
New Years Eve
108 Bells
Sat Dec 14
2pm - 5pm
Honoring December Holidays
Fri, Nov 15
7pm - 9pm
Gather at 6:30pm
Mindful Peacebuilding Through Music
Impromptu Musical Evening
Sat Nov 16
Gather at 1:30pm
2pm - 5pm
Mindful Pre-Thanksgiving
Sunday Oct 13, 8amPST.--re-scheduled
"Apologizing to Mother Earth
and the Land Ancestors"
with Louise Dunlap
(recording of EarthHolders' webinar
Info: simona.coayladuba@gmail.com)
Louise's forthcoming book is about her ancestors, the land they settled and passed down, and the stories of settlement that they did not tell
www.louisedunlap.net
June 15, 2019
Gathering with
Encampment for Citizenship
May 16-27, 2019
Bodhisattvas In Action:
Engaging Societal Challenges with the Energy of Mindfulness
Mindful Peacebuilding Retreat
co-hosted with Sugarplum Sangha
at Mariposa Institute, Ukiah, CA
Practice and Teachings offered by Dharma Teachers and lay practitioners
from the Plum Village Community of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh
Br Phap Tri, Diane Little Eagle, Jo-ann Rosen and others
Apr 6
Mindful Pre-Passover
Passover Resource Reader Available
Mar 31
Racial Equity Practice with Sandra Kim
Mar 23
Children's Inclusivity Library Reading
and Origami Paper-Crane Making for Immigration Protest
Feb 16
Quarterly Mindful Music-Making
Mindful Peacebuilding Through Informal Music Making Together
Fiddle, Ukulele, Recorders, Piano, Guitar
Jan 4
Combatants for Peace
hosted by MPB Middle East Listening Circle
2018
Dec 31
New Years Eve Bell of Awakening
Sounding the Bell 108 Times
Dec 15
Benefit with Charity Cellists
for MPB Projects
San Quentin Post-Release Emergency Fund
Transforming Trauma Training:
Community Resilience Model (CRM)
with Israelis and Palestinians
Nov 20
Thanksgiving Resource Reader
Available by Request
Nov 2
Mindful Peacebuilding Through Informal Music Making Together
Fiddle, Ukulele, Recorders, Piano, Guitar
Oct 27
Transforming Trauma: Community Resilence Model (CRM)
Introduction with Victoria Mausisa
Sep 22
Inter-Faith Pilgrimage To Angel Island
Mindful Peacebuilding members joined this pilgrimage
organized by Interfaith Movement for Human Integrity
Aug 25
Compassionate Eating
for Ourselves, Animals, and Our Planet
(Click on Resources)
Aug 25
MPB Inclusiveness Library
for Children and Adults
Reading and Discussion
THE NAME JAR by Yangsook Choi
Having just arrived from Korea with her family, Unhei is anxious about making friends.
Worried that no one will be able to pronounce her name, she decides to pick a new name.
But when a large glass jar filled with names appears on her desk, Unhei happily discovers that her classmates want to help.
MINDFULNESS-BASED APPROACH TO PEACEBUILDING
Small Groups
Face-to-Face Gatherings
Zoom Gatherings
Listening Circles, Holiday Observances
Public Action, Community Service
Meditation and Study Groups, Retreats
Listening Circles
Listening circles are grounded in awareness of the breath. In a listening circle, participants create with each other a safe emotional space in which they can share perspectives and personal experiences related to peacebuilding challenges that may be confusing, controversial, and deeply felt. Participation in a listening circle helps develop basic skills essential for mindfulness-based peacebuilding: capacity to be present for strong emotion and views different from one's own; capacity to listen to oneself and to share with others in a way that others can hear, capacity to deepen understanding for points of view different from one's own. Participants do their best to listen with an open heart and speak their truth with kindness. Mindfulness-based listening circles nourish understanding, creativity, friendship, imagination, and commitment to action in the context of inclusive and diverse community,
Topics are chosen by participants and have included Multi-Faith Sharing, Middle East Inquiry, Recognizing and Ending Racism, Creative Arts, MindfulPrisonPractice.
Holiday Gatherings
Meditative silence, new and traditional rituals, personal stories of experience with the holiday, stories of collective suffering related to the holiday, eating and singing together: all of these come together to create a joyful and meaningful mindfulness-based holiday gathering in community. Participation in a holiday gathering helps develop basic skills essential for mindfulness-based peacebuilding: capacity to deepen the meaning of a civic or religious holiday, capacity to transform and heal suffering connected with the holiday, capacity to open the heart for deepening understanding, cultivate gratitude and joy, and generate sustainable commitment for engaging in compassionate action to build beloved communities grounded in the values of inclusiveness, diversity, and power-with relationships.
Holidays have included Thanksgiving, Easter/Passover, Labor Day, July Fourth, Martin L King Day as well as monthly gatherings which honor special days of a particular month.
Public Action and Community Service
Offering mindful presence at public demonstrations; organizing and participating in peace walks; planting trees; preparing food at shelters for young adults who are homeless; speaking and writing in public forums are examples of Mindful Peacebuilding's public action and community service.
Participation in mindfulness-based public action and community service helps develop basic skills essential for mindfulness-based peacebuilding: capacity to manifest qualities that support inclusive, diverse, and power-with beloved community; and capacity to refrain from using language and images that belittle, blame, demean, shame, and demonize others as "the enemy."
Retreats and Classes
Participation in mindfulness-based retreats and classes helps develop basic skills essential for mindfulness-based peacebuilding and building inclusive, diverse communities grounded in power-with relationships. Specific skillbuilding classes may include public speaking and writing, mediation, cross-cultural competency, compassionate and nonviolent communication, creative arts, tai chi, interplay, ikebana (flower-arranging). Participation helps develop the capacity to embody the energy of mindfulness and manifest joy, compassion, kindness, and generosity in everyday life and the capacity for creativity, curiosity, and imagination in the service of collective healing and transformation. Concerns related to climate change, food security, access to clean water, immigration, the school-to-prison pipeline, racial justice and other concerns may be addressed.
Through sharing information, inquiry, personal experiences, and inspiring stories in a mindful context, participants in mindfulness-based retreats and classes deepen their understanding and practice of a mindfulness-based approach to peacebuilding in daily life and public action.
WHO WE ARE Mindful Peacebuilding is an inclusive welcoming community offering a mindfulness-based approach to cultivating peace and justice. We draw inspiration from the wisdom and compassion teachings of ancestral traditions and contemporary peacemakers such as Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh as well as from young people, ancestral traditions, and the world of nature. We are open to all who wish to engage societal challenges in a mindful context. "To develop the drop of compassion in our heart is the only effective spiritual response to hatred and violence." --Thich Nhat Hanh HistoryInspired by nonviolent movements for social change and by the teachings and practice of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh and other peacemakers, a small group of people of diverse racial and cultural backgrounds came together in community in 2003 to engage in study of non-violent communication and monthly peace walks. Eventually they decided to form a nonprofit which could water the seeds of a mindfulness-based approach to peacebuilding through participation in listening circles, mindful holiday gatherings, retreats, community service, and public action. Mindful Peacebuilding, a community volunteers functioning through gift economics, incorporated in 2011 as a 501 (c)(3) nonprofit organization. Why Engage in Mindful Peacebuilding? "What draws me to Mindful Peacebuilding is --I want to be a part of co-creating something with a diverse group of people. I've been part of a lot of organizations with a lot of protest and conflict. I want to be part of something that has the intention of practicing mindfully, using a talking piece, listening deeply to each other."--DB "What draws me to Mindful Peacebuilding is --"I was born during war in my country, Vietnam. There was a lot of violence, a lot of conflict. I came to realize that war is a result of two groups of people having strong opinions about something, and they want to kill each other. The purpose of Mindful Peacebuilding for me is to learn how to be present... to learn how to live peacefully myself, and then, how to make that circle wider."--CN "What draws me to Mindful Peacebuilding is --"My roots are white European-American: German, Russian, and Latvian Jewish. In high school, I learned about the Holocaust, and the enslavement of African peoples and the genocide of indigenous peoples. I learned about so many terrible things that human beings do to each other. There is so much suffering. Since then, I've been asking the questions, "How can human beings make each other suffer so much?" "Why do human beings make each other suffer so much?""How can that be stopped, ended?" For me, Mindful Peacebuilding is one response to those questions. What draws me to Mindful Peacebuilding is the possibility of bringing together the energy of mindfulness and the skills of peacebuilding in ways that can be easily repeated anywhere."--LF Board of Directors, CurrentAntoinette GonzalezAJ JohnstonJun HamamotoKSuzanne Massey, ChairJina ShahSusan SchulmanVictoria Mausisa Founding Board Members and AdvisorsAndrew DeckertChinh NguyenDevin BerryDiana WearHerman YeeJoanna Poz-MoleskyLyn FineMaryAnn O'SullivanSharon Moy
RESOURCES
RESOURCES/VIDEO LINKS
Feb 19--Documentary: "No Time To Waste"
Honoring Betty Reid Soskin
Interfaith Vigil of Remembrance and Solidarity
Join us on Saturday, Feb 12, 11am - 12:30pm PST for an interfaith vigil to remember the 80th Anniversary of Executive Order 9066 signed by Franklin D. Roosevelt that led to the mass incarceration of 120,000 mostly Japanese Americans. This shameful part of American History must be remembered to ensure the survivors stories are not forgotten, and this injustice is repaired.
During Black History Month, while we remember this legacy in the Japanese American community, we will also be calling for solidarity with: Reparations for African Americans and Stop AAPI Hate. Let us acknowledge that U.S. imperialism globally, xenophobia, and systemic racism have all been common threads that weave our struggles together, historically and today.
We invite people of all faiths, cultures, and traditions to join us!
Nov 6, 2021 Circle
Armistice Day/Veterans Day
John McCutcheon - Christmas in the Trenches
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5on4WK1MpA
Total: 7 min
Three Powerful Indigenous Women
—approx 20 min TOTAL
Joy Harjo - Poet Laureate
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxNmaE8tzJI
begin at 2:41 end at 9:07 (before poem)
Marie’s Dictionary- Language Protector
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRDmRXCizEM
Total: 9:35 minutes
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/06/us/marie-wilcox-dead.html
Robin Wall Kimmerer. - Land Protector
Bioneers—20 minutes total—start with 2:02
“forest”—
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cumEQcRMY3c&t=868s
Sept 11 MPB Circle
Videos:
Gandhi: Clip from movie--Gandhi's first protest in South Africa,
leading to Satyagraha Movement --Sept 11, 1906
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNmJqRV7LOA
Let There Be Peace On Earth
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPH4LRASWbo
Poem by Hokusai, read by Roger Keyes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-_6K56uz-k
Books:
Toni Morrison--The Measure of Our Lives
Michael Eric Dyson--Long Time Coming: Reckoning with Race in America
Catherine Ingram--In the Footsteps of Gandhi: Conversations with Spiritual Social Activists
Mark Andreas--Sweet Fruit from the Bitter Tree: 61 Stories of Creative and Compassionate Ways Out of Conflict
Listening Circle--June 26
Restorative Justice on the Rise.org
What Is June-teenth?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4tvAY5rwK8
Opal Lee: 94-year-old community activist Opal Lee has pushed for years and years to make Juneteenth a federal holiday
https://twitter.com/i/status/1404930053721493513
"Juneteenth Jamboree" - Fatso Bentley
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqPfSWEFMtc
Juneteenth Jamboree: From a Free Place to Displace
https://www.pbs.org/video/juneteenth-jamboree-from-a-free-place-to-displace-kh3o0z/
What Is the Summer Solstice?Breathe LiveListening Circle, March 13
A. SEASON FOR NONVIOLENCE JAN 30-APRIL 4
Link--Mandala daily practice for building a culture of true peace
http://agnt.org/snv/livingpeace/wordsmandala.html#
B. JOIN ORGANIZING FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE
1. SURJ (Standing Up For Racial Justice) Skill-building on Saturday Mornings
2. POOR PEOPLE'S CAMPAIGN - REV BARBER--Meetings on Mondays
3. JEWISH GATEWAYS RACIAL JUSTICE CONVERSATIONS
--Second and Fourth Monday Evenings, 7pm-8:30pm PT
C. POEM--"Spring" by Mary Oliver
https://www.best-poems.net/mary_oliver/spring.htmlD. VIDEO--Miriam Makeba (birthday--March 4)E.CHANT TO SHIVA--Shivaratri--March 11)Hindu practice, honoring Shiva--Om namah Shivaya Ram (Sanskrit: ॐ नमः शिबय)By Jai-Jagdeeshhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKuYvqFYPqwOther Events of Note
--First Two Weeks of March
March 4, 1917 --First woman elected to House of Representatives: Jeanette Rankin from Montana...
March 10, 2006 --500,000 people march in Chicago for Immigrant Rights...
March 11, 2010 -In Japan, Fukushima Tsunami
March 12, 1994--Church of England ordains 32 women priests, ending Anglican Church sexist tradition of 450 years
RECOMMENDATIONS FROM PAST LISTENING CIRCLES
Sunday, March 21--11am - 1pm PTSit Walk ListenSan Francisco City Hall: #StopAsianHateFacebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/743250929897703/Indybay event: https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2021/03/18/18840893.phpSchedule of Events11:00 - 11:10 am // Arrival and welcome11:10 - 11:30 am // Mindfulness meditation11:30 - 11:50 am // Movement12:00 - 12:50 pm // Listening circles12:50 - 1:00 pm // Closing and announcementsFrom organizers Melanie and Ivan:With tenderness and mourning on our hearts, the Sit Walk Listen organizers invite you to gather in front of San Francisco’s City Hall this Sunday from 11am - 1pm PT to grieve the eight lives lost in Atlanta, Georgia this past Tuesday. Six of those killed were of Asian descent, seven were women, two were white.White supremacy affects all of us. Since March 2020, about 3,800 racist incidents against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have been reported to Stop AAPI Hate. Let us join together against anti-Asian racism and discrimination, and amplify the calls for a more peaceful, just society. We need accountability, we need reparations.Xiaojie Tan, Daoyou Feng, Delaina Ashley Yaun, Paul Andre Michels, Julie Park, Hyeon Jeong Park, plus two as of yet unnamed. We say the names of those who should be alive today as we work towards justice alongside our Asian sisters, brothers, and kin. This itself is a healing practice learned from Black women in their struggle against white supremacy and police brutality against Black, brown, and Indigenous peoples, and all people of color.FEBRUARY 27 --HAPPY LUNAR NEW YEAR!! HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!Plum Village Community of Engaged BuddhismCalligraphy“Sitting in freedom on this sacred land”“Walking in peace everywhere on earth”https://plumvillage.org/articles/2021-lunar-new-year-parallel-verses/VIDEO--Celebrating James Lawson, A Civil Rights Giant (6min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thQAD54QvBM
SEASON FOR NONVIOLENCE JAN 30-APRIL 4
Mandala--daily practice for building a culture of true peace
http://agnt.org/snv/livingpeace/wordsmandala.html#
BOOKS
Alicia Garza--The Promise of Power: How We Come Together When We Fall Apart
Catherine Ingram--In the Footsteps of Gandhi
Robin Wall Kimmerer--Braiding Sweetgrass
THE ARTS: SR WENDY AT THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM IN NYC
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhrUsd457_E&list=PLUVEt_tZwZGmaBC9JVgLENdHVIAvH2S6f
MINDFUL PEACEBUILDING TALK--NOV 2020
Planting Justice--Gavin Raders, Nov 2020
plantingjustice.org
(Start at 15:30)
Passcode: ?5q46%t=
Deepen Understanding: Connect, Listen, Learn
Webinar Recording: Duncan Ryūken Williams: "The Karma of a Nation:
Racial Reparations from an Asian American Buddhist Perspective"
90 minutes--historical perspectives, Q and A begins at about 55 minutesstreamed March 16, 2021Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8k3sr-5wQWoHarvard Buddhist Community--Buddhism and Race Speaker Seriesvisit www.buddhismandrace.comRe-imagine and Co-create
ensure the safety and well-being of historically and currently marginalized communities in challenging situations
A Chinese Immigrant, and a Zen Master of the Korean Jogye OrderDear Fellow Buddhist Teachers,Please behold my open letter with your awakened heart and the compassion of our ancient vows, as I know you will. This Tuesday’s horrific shooting in Atlanta has eight victims; six of them are Asian women, just like me. The event deeply shocked the Asian American community and me, so I am asking for your help on behalf of us all.The spike of violence against Asians may have entered your radar only recently, but for us, it has been a lived reality starting the day Wuhan locked down. People in my community felt erased and did not know where to go. The mainstream media has only begun reporting these incidents in recent months.While it is within reach for me to practice Metta and Tonglen, many of my fellow Asians living in the West might not be able to. The knee-jerk reaction is to feel hurt, marginalized, and fearful when they experience or witness anti-Asian attacks and see vandalization reports of Asian Buddhist temples. It breaks my heart to see my elderly friends pushed further to the margins by fear and isolation.As an immigrant who went through English-speaking schools, I know there are countless people like you who see much more than just stereotypes when you see Asians like me, such as a model minority, a perpetual foreigner, or a potential Asian girlfriend when you meet us, but many of my fellow Asian expats might not know this. As someone who teaches Dharma alongside Westerners, I know there are non-Asian Buddhist leaders like many of you who pay daily homage to spiritual ancestors looking a bit like my grandfather, but that is not common knowledge among Asians.As Korean American Zen priest Cristina Moon puts it, “we must start by reinvesting in the institutions where the Asian American community has historically developed strength.” I see great potential for healing and unity if members of our Asian community know that many non-marginalized people live to embody the teachings of Asian spiritual ancestors day in, day out, and breath in, breath out. I can imagine how much safer and included my Asian brothers and sisters would feel if they knew this, but the message needs to come from you.My Dharma friends, I’m asking your help to bridge the rift created by the COVID-19 and racism dual pandemic. The practice of care and healing has as many faces as Avalokiteshvara. To name a few ideas, you might invite your Asian neighbors to honor your spiritual ancestors together or publicly post Buddhist quotes in an Asian language. Perhaps your center or group might host ESL classes for immigrants or offer an afterschool homework place for their children to foster long-term connections. I’m confident that you and your community can envision much more, just as I am convinced that you are in a uniquely powerful position to do so.In Chinese Buddhism, we have a saying, “One lamp can puncture a thousand years of darkness.” We have all vowed to be this lamp for ourselves and all sentient beings. Now is the time to bring our lights of wisdom and compassion to the greater society, starting by giving more Asians a caring hand from the Western Buddhist community.Please forward this email widely.
March 27, 2021Meditations and Links from Listening CircleFilm: The Way HomeVideo: https://www.world-trust.org/shaktibutlerQuote:"We can’t get to a new place in an old way.Systems live in us - so healing has to happen.If we are truly going to bring forth institutionswhere Black lives matter, we have to transform ourselvesas we transform the world."--Fania Davis, Civil Rights Lawyer;Author, The LIttle Book of Race and Restorative Justice:Black Lives, Healing, and US Social TransformationMeditation: Lovingkindness (Metta)by Konda Masonfrom: Podcast--Brown Rice Hour (beherenownetwork.com)Conversation/Episode #1: Konda Mason with Fania DavisHealing Through Restorative JusticeMeditation is at 1:09:56 (last 2-3 minutes of Episode #1)Metta Meditation(adapt with "May all _________lives be safe and protected..."e.g., Indigenous, Korean, Japanese, Taiwanese, Filipino/a, Vietnamese, Chinese, Cambodian, Indian, Sri Lankan, Mexican, Honduran, Guatemalan, Nicaraguan, Costa Rican, El Salvadoran, Jewish, Palestinian, Arab, Muslim, etc etc)May all Black lives be safe and protectedand resourced abundantlywith housing, and healthy food to eatand clean water to drinkand the health care that is neededand may every Black mother’s childbe valued equally as every White mother’s childand be provided with the same loveand care and resourcesto live their lives fullyAnd may the delusion of White supremacybe laid to restand may all beings live in the understandingthat we are deeply interconnected to each otherand to the earth and to all speciesand may all beings be free from sufferingand the causes of sufferingand may Black lives matter…*************Metta for the week of Passover, 2021may the eight days of the passover weekbring deepening compassion and wisdommay we travel with joy as step by stepwe make our way, walking, walkingthrough desert sands and storms,continuing individual and collective journeystowards the promised land:heart-mind-soul resting in non-fear,with liberation and transformative justice for allNov 7 Listening Circle
UPCOMING
Nov 14—Training with Kazu Haga and East Point Peace Academy
Register through East Bay Meditation Center
ORGANIZATION----www.braverangels.org
Dialogue across political differences
BOOKS AND POEMS
Prayer: Howard Thurman—Prayer for a Friendly World
Book: Ibram X Kendi--Stamped from the Beginning
Poems: Mary Oliver
—The Journey
—The Uses of Sorrow
Gatha(Practice Poem)--Thich Nhat Hanh
"Waking up this morning, I smile
24 brand new hours are before me
I vow to live fully in each moment
And to look at all beings
with eyes of compassion
VIDEOS
Nimo Patel (Empty Hands)
“We Shall Overcome”
John Legend —Glory
Van Jones— CNN clip
Ray Charles singing “America”—john mccain/baseball…
VIDEO RECOMMENDED—
Andrew
https://www.nsclimateaction.org/film-screening-the-condor-and-the-eagle
“The Condor and The Eagle”
Thursday November 19, 2020
4:30pm – 7pm
~ THIS INSPIRING FILM OFFERS HOPE IN THESE UNCERTAIN TIMES AND REMINDS US OF OUR DEEP INTERCONNECTEDNESS WITH THE EARTH AND ONE ANOTHER!
The 70 min film will start at 4:30pm Pacific Time. Immediately following the film there will be a special panel discussion (~ 6pm) featuring the film protagonists Casey Camp-Horinek and Patricia Gualinga as well as Hereditary Chief Phil Lane Jr. who will be the panel moderator for the discussion, and Francisco Morales who is an Indigenous member of the Aymara community in Argentina and United Religions Initiative trustee. North State Climate Action (NSCA), one of numerous sponsoring organizations, is thrilled to have Jonathon Freeman, Founder and Director of Native Roots Network (NRN), a nexus of traditional wisdom, cultural innovation and cross-cultural education to advance Native OR another NRN representative joining the discussion.
For more information and to register for this exciting event please
visit:
https://www.nsclimateaction.org/film-screening-the-condor-and-the-eagle
Cost: Free Will Donation
Questions? Email us at action@nsclimateaction.org
Please Share on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/3989900984373325
OCT 24, 2020 LISTENING CIRCLE
Video: Grateful
One Power video--offered by Enid
Video: Wonderful World--Louis Armstrong
With images--offered by Shabana
On Being.org
tracy k smith reading
poem—unrest in baton rouge
--offered by Annie
MEDITATIONS AND PRAYERS
Meditations for Opening the Heart-Mind:
Four Elements of Love—kindness, joy, compassion, equanimity
Compassion Meditation
adapted from Mindful of Race, by Ruth King., p 159
Become aware of the in-breath, the out-breath
Notice and send a greeting to parts of the body:
toes, knees, hip-bones, heart, lungs, kidneys,
reproductive system, digestive system,
the spine, the collar bones,
the eyes, ears, tongue, teeth, jawbones,
throat, energy center between the eyes
energy center at the top of the head
Now bring awareness to the inner children of different ages,
and offer them the following words of compassion and kindness.
Continue in widening circles of awareness
to near and dear ones, and those not known...
I am here. I am here for you.
I care about you.
I care about your joy.
I care about your suffering.
I am holding your pain and sorrow with compassion
May you be soothed, may you be healed.
May your fears dissolve.
I’m sorry you have been harmed, ignored, and dismissed.
I will stay with you. I will breathe with you.
I may not know how to support you in the best way,
but it is my wish to do so.
I am here. I am here for you.
I care about you.
I care about your joy.
I care about your suffering.
I am holding your pain and sorrow with compassion
Equanimity Meditation
adapted from Mindful of Race, by Ruth King., p 249
May I see the world with quiet eyes.
May I offer my care without hesitation,
knowing I may be met with gratitude, anger,
or resistance.
May I find the inner resources
to genuinely contribute where needed.
May I contribute where needed
without attachment to outcome.
May I remain peaceful within.
I care about the pain of others,
yet I know I cannot control it.
May I offer care,
knowing I don’t control the course of life,
suffering, or death.
I wish all beings contentment,
but I cannot make their choices for them
I care for all beings,
and I realize my way is not the only way.
All beings have their own journey,
and I have mine.
May I offer my support,
knowing that what I offer
may be of great benefit,
some benefit, or even no benefit.
May I bear witness to things just as they are.
May I offer my prayer without conditions,
knowing I may be met with appreciation,
resentment, and resistance.
From: Awakening Joy: Ten Steps to Happiness
by James Baraz
Step 1- Inclining the Mind Toward Joy
Step 2- Mindfulness: Being Present for Your Life
Step 3- Grateful Heart, Joyful Heart
Step 4- Finding Joy in Difficult times
Step 5- The Bliss of Blamelessness
Step 6—The Joy of Letting Go
Step 7—The Sweetness of Loving Ourselves
Step 8—The Joy of Loving Others
Step 9—Compassion: The Natural Expression of a Joyful Heaert
Step 10—The Joy of Simply Being
Prayer for Healing
M’She-beirach—Debby Friedman
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HX5TWsfykSs&list=RDpHKo3CjuzpY&index=2
Mi shebeirach avoteinu
M’kor hab’racha l’imoteinu
May the source of strength
Who blessed the ones before us,
Help us find the courage
to make our lives a blessing
And let us say,
Amen
Mi shebeirach imoteinu
M’kor habrachah l’avoteinu
Bless those in need of healing
with r’fuah sh’leimah
The renewal of body
the renewal of spirit
And let us say,
Amen
Meditation: GRACE
adapted from Joan Halifax, Standing At the Edge:
Finding Freedom Where Fear and Courage Meet, p 241-242
Gather attention
Recall Intention
Attune to Self and Other
Consider What Will Serve
Engage and End
Mother's Day Proclamation--Boston, 1870
Written by abolitionist Julia Ward Howe
--
https://peacealliance.org/history-of-mothers-day-as-a-day-of-peace-julia-ward-howe/
“Arise, then… women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts,
whether our baptism be that of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
We will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies.
Our husbands shall not come to us, reeking with carnage,
for caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
all that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, women of one country, will be too tender of those of another country
to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.From the bosom of the devastated earth a voice goes up with our own.
It says: Disarm, Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice.
Blood does not wipe out dishonor,
nor violence vindicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
at the summons of war,
let women now leave all that may be left of home
for a great and earnest day of council.Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them then solemnly take council with each other as to the means
whereby the great human family can live in peace,
each bearing after his own kind the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
but of God.In the name of womanhood and of humanity, I earnestly ask
that a general congress of women, without limit of nationality,
may be appointed and held at some place deemed most convenient,
and at the earliest period consistent with its objects,
to promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
the amicable settlement of international questions,
the great and general interests of peace.“On Compassion For Animals and Compassionate Eating
Thich Nhat Hanh
from: The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching
"If while we eat, we destroy living beings or the environment, we are eating the flesh of our own sons and daughters. We need to look deeply together and discuss how to eat, what to eat and what to resist. If we are mindful, we will know whether we are ‘ingesting’ the toxins of fear, hatred and violence, or eating foods that encourage understanding, compassion, and the determination to help others."
Meditation on Mindful Consumption
Touching the Earth
I touch the earth three times to nourish my awareness of the suffering of all species in the world and to help me to nourish my compassion.
I have made the vow to be vegetarian and I feel happy and peaceful because of this. I know that vegetarian food can taste good and be wholesome at the same time... There are many people who are vegetarian because they are aware that to be vegetarian is beneficial for spiritual, physical and mental health. There are also people who are vegetarian because they want to nourish their compassion.
I am happy when I see that there are associations that are striving to protect animals by preserving their natural habitats or preventing people from using animals in harmful experiments. . . .
QUOTES (alphabetical by first name)
Audre Lorde
.. .and when we speak we are afraid
our words will not be heard
nor welcomed
but when we are silent
we are still afraid
So it is better to speak . . .Georgia O'Keefe
Nobody sees a flower--really--it is so small it takes time--we haven't time--
and to see takes time, like to have a friend takes time.
Henri Nouwen
We cannot change the world by a new plan, project or idea. We cannot even change other people by our convictions, stories, advice and proposals, but we can offer a space where people are encouraged to disarm themselves, lay aside their occupations and preoccupations, and listen with attention and care to the voices speaking in their own center.Howard Thurman
Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it.
Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.
A dream is the bearer of a new possibility, the enlarged horizon, the great hope.Luther Standing Bear
Silence was meaningful with the Lakota, and their granting a space of silence to the speech-makers and their own moment of silence before talking was done in the practice of true politeness, listening, and regard for the rule, "thought comes before speech." Conversation was never begun at once, nor in a hurried manner. No one was quick with a question, no matter how important, and no one was pressed for an answer. A pause giving time for thought was the truly courteous way of beginning and conducting a conversation.
Mohandas K. Gandhi
The means may be likened to a seed, the end to a tree;
and there is just the same inviolable connection
between the means and the end
as there is between the seed and the tree.
Robert Kennedy
Johannesburg, South Africa, 1963
Tiny Ripples of Hope
Few have the greatness to bend history itself,but each of us can work
to change a small portion of the events,
and in the total of these acts
will be written the history of this generation.
It is from numerous diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a [wo]man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the life of others, or strikes out against an injustice, [s]he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope that crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, these ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.
And I believe that in this generation those with the courage to enter the moral conflict will find themselves with companions in every corner of the globe.
Songs For Mindful Peacebuilding
We Shall be Known (by MaMuse)
Performed by Thrive East Bay Choir
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKhjaN72dRQ#action=share
LYRICS
We shall be known by the company we keep
By the ones who circle round to tend these fires
We shall be known by the ones who sow and reap
The seeds of change, alive from deep within the earth
It is time now, it is time now that we thrive
It is time we lead ourselves into the well
It is time now, and what a time to be alive
In this Great Turning we shall learn to lead in love
In this Great Turning we shall learn to lead in lovePart 1
We shall be known by the company we keep
By the ones who circle round to tend these fires
We shall be known by the ones who sow and reap
The seeds of change, alive from deep within the earth
Part 2It is time now, it is time now that we thrive
It is time we lead ourselves into the well
It is time now, and what a time to be alive
In this Great Turning we shall learn to lead in love
In this Great Turning we shall learn to lead in loveSongs By Betsy Ros
May I Be Happy...
Children in a school in Oakland, CA sing with singer-songwriter Betsy Rose:
"May I Be Happy, May I Be Peaceful, May I Be Filled With Love
May You Be Happy, May You Be Peaceful, May You Be Filled With Love
May We Be Happy, May We Be Peaceful, May We Be Filled With Love"
--VIDEO by David Nelson, David Nelson Productions
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RU_Vj0kytFo
I Hold My Face In My Two Hands
(Words adapted from poem For Warmth by Thich Nhat Hanh)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfkujnf6JKM
If You’re Happy Take A Breath
(NEW WORDS by Betsy Rose to Children's Song)
If you’re happy and you know it, take a breath.
If you’re happy and you know it take a breath.
If you’re happy and you’re breathing, all your joy will be increasing,
Breathing in and out is sweet, so take a breath!
If you’re angry and you know it take a breath.
If you’re angry and you know it take a breath.
If you’re angry and you know it take a breath before you blow it,
You can choose how you will show it, take a breath!
If you’re scared and you know it take a breath.
If you’re scared and you know it take a breath.
If you’re scared and you’re breathing, all your fears will soon be leaving,
You’ll feel stronger if you stop and take a breath!
If you’re sad and you know it take a breath.
If you’re sad and you know it take a breath.
If you’re sad and you breathe, it will give your heart some ease,
And you’ll know just what you need, so take a breath!
If you don’t know what you’re feeling, take a breath.
If you don’t know what you’re feeling, take a breath.
It’s okay if you don’t know, you can breath and just let go,
You’re alive from head to toe, so take a breath!
July 11, 18
June 13, 20, 27
May 30--Honoring May
May Day, Cinco de Mayo, Buddha's Birthday,
Mothers Day, Memorial Day
May 16--Creative Arts
Origami Practice
--Jun Hamamoto (MBP Board Member)
Jun shared with the community how to fold origami hearts, and suggested writing note of gratitude on the heart, taking a picture of the origami heart and posting it on facebook and sending to friends and loved ones, or putting the heart in the window of one's home…Jun has been teaching origami classes for many years at San Quentin, where participants find it a meditative and deeply connective practice. Some said they fold every night, it calms them...
Folding origami cranes
website and facebook
campaigns
1) folding4justice—facebook page (Please 'like')
2) https://tsuruforsolidarity.org/
tsuru for solidarity--
to protest detentions, over 200,000 origami cranes
will be sent to Congress and there will be a virtual march
to Washington june 6-7
Offerings from the Community
KSuzanne : Langston Hughes poem—dream deferred
Bernice reads original poem
Enid reads poem—Winter Grief by David Whyte
Elise reads original poem—-"after all we have survived"
Curtis reads prose he is writing—the archive of belonging
Alely shares an acrylic painting she painted this morning
Genevieve—offers basket of origami cranes made with friends for Tsuru for Solidarity CampaignLyn--offers practice of re-purposing magazines and catalogues
to create vision board and soul collage
Curtis recommends writings:
1) Clarissa Sligh--Transforming Hate
https://clarissasligh.com/themes/transformation-change/transforming-hate/
2) Tia BlassingameAnnie offers song: If You’re Happy Take A Breath
(New Words by Betsy Rose to Children's Song--
(for additional lyrics, click on RESOURCES in Menu Bar)
If you’re happy and you know it, take a breath.
If you’re happy and you know it take a breath.
If you’re happy and you’re breathing, all your joy will be increasing,
Breathing in and out is sweet, so take a breath!
Saturday Afternoon Listening Circles
--April-June 2020
Meditation--Earth Touching, Breathing
adapted from these two poems by Thich Nhat Hanh
in Please Call Me By My True Names
Ramadan--Islamic Call To Prayer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBNUdeWw-wE
RESOURCES: Stories
Story For Our Times
Ancestors:
Great-Grandson Mindfully Hugs Great-Grandmother
STORY OF TWO WOLVES (adapted)
A Native American grandfather and grandmother were talking to their grandchild about feelings. The grandmother and the grandfather said, "It is as if there are two wolves fighting in the heart. One wolf is vengeful and angry and violent. The other wolf is loving, compassionate, kind, and generous." The grandchild asked the grandparents, "Which wolf will win the fight, Grandfather and Grandmother?"Grandmother and Grandfather smiled. Each of them hugged the child, and then the three hugged together. Then Grandmother and Grandfather paused and took a breath. Then Grandmother said, with a gentle voice, "Dear Child, it is the one we feed that will win." And Grandfather said, ever so gently, "Which one shall we feed, my child? How shall we feed it?"
The Joy Of Being Alive on Planet Earth!
--Descendant Eating An Apple
Inspiration: Posters and Pictures
PICTURE: Social Clubs Support Social Justice
from South Berkeley Senior Stories. Artist: Clayton Anderson
Mary Trahan Interviewed by Sara Bruckmeier.
Website: http//sbss.bborucki.com
Five Years Ago!
End of Year Letter and Highlights/2015
Dear Friend,
A warm greeting of the season to you! We at Mindful Peacebuilding are reaching out to you at this time to share highlights from 2015 and express our gratitude. If you are hearing from us for the first time, it may be because you signed a list at one of our events during the last few years or someone you know has thought this may be of interest to you. In this letter, we take this opportunity to introduce our mindfulness-based approach to peacebuilding. Thank you for reading on and considering how you might contribute and participate.
Mindful Peacebuilding is a national nonprofit networking community whose mission is to support people in promoting a culture of peace on the planet with a mindfulness-based approach. Seeds of inner, inter-personal, and societal peace are watered through mindfulness-based community service, public action, retreats, classes, listening circles and holiday gatherings. Started in 2011 by students of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh, the community is a volunteer educational organization open to all who wish to engage social concerns in a mindful context.
We encourage you to consider being a part of this community. Share with us some of the social concerns you are passionate about and daily-life stories of "moments of mindful peacebuilding." What are you currently engaging with? What would you like to engage with more fully? Let us know if you would like to join or start a mindfulness-based peacebuilding practice group where you are, and we will do our best to be of help.
We invite you as well to contribute financial support. To donate via the web, please go to www.mindfulpeacebuilding.org. To donate by check, please mail check to Mindful Peacebuilding, PO Box 5612, Elmwood Station, Berkeley, CA. 94705.
We send you blessings of the season, for joy and well-being.
Lyn, Sue, Victoria, Herman
Mindful Peacebuilding Leadership CircleMindful Peacebuilding
Inspiring Highlights 2015
Mindfulness in Prison: Practice at San Quentin
Origami Classes: Quote from participant, "the Origami folding class was a first for me, a good “first” in that I was doing more than folding paper into different shapes and designs. I was participating in the 70,000 Cranes for Peace and partaking in the suffering that comes from war and nuclear weapons. Now when I fold Origami I will always fold for peace.”Incarcerated men at San Quentin experienced the peace of Origami Paper-folding as they made thousands of paper cranes. They contributed the cranes not only to the Hiroshima-Nagasaki 70th anniversary remembrance, but also to Oakland’s Children’s Hospital and to the Tree of Hope at San Francisco’s City Hall lighted in December. The Origami classes were taught by a MindfulPeacebuilding volunteer.
San Quentin Day of Peace Committee: Mindful Peacebuilding volunteers joined the men inside to help plan the Annual Day of Peace Celebration inside this state prison.
"We offer peace as an alternative to violence..." say the men on the committee.
To invite support and public awareness for this event, Mindful Peacebuilding volunteers helped find venues to display Day of Peace paintings made by the men inside.
Days of Mindfulness: incarcerated men and volunteers from the outside joined together for sitting, walking, and eating meditation, panel presentations, and small-circle sharing.
Classes and Retreats: Healing and Transforming Historical Harm
* Half-Day of Mindfulness, Exploring White Awareness
* Class, “What Does It Mean To Be White”
* Roots Retreats, Local, Regional, NationalMindfulness Meditation Practice Group (Sangha)..
Weekly meditation group includes sitting and walking meditation and reflection on readings that are also emailed to the wider Mindful Peacebuilding Community: Joanna Macy’s Active Hope; Pema Chodren’s Practicing Peace in Times of War; and Thich Nhat Hanh’s Cultivating True Peace and Together We Are One.
Mindful Holiday Gatherings and
Days of Awareness, Action, and Inquiry
Inspirational resource materials are available for mindful holiday gatherings. In addition to singing, mindful sitting, walking and eating meditation, gatherings often include sharing of personal experience and discussion of ways to challenge oppression and transform and heal suffering connected with the holidays. Gatherings in 2015:· Prison awareness and action, Honoring precious water (Jan – March)
· ML King, Easter and Passover (April - June)
· July 4th, The Right To Vote/Women’s Suffrage, Labor Day/Workers’ Rights (July – Sept)
· Gandhi and Questions Related to Non-Violence, Peace Walk for Middle East, Thanksgiving, New Year’s Eve Bell Ringing (Oct - Dec)
Community Service
· YEAH! Mindful Peacebuilding volunteers cook dinner once or twice a month for young adults at YEAH!, a program in Berkeley that serves 18-25 year olds who are temporarily homeless
· Diversity Library of Children’s Books created by a Mindful Peacebuildingvolunteer
Public Awareness and Action: Addressing Climate Change
Mindful Peacebuilding groups in Redding, CA and Ukiah, CA were formed to participate in an Ecosattva 8-week on-line training…Mindful Peacebuilding offered peaceful presence at Oakland's climate change march.We encourage you to learn more and participate!
CONTACT
MINDFUL PEACEBUILDING
PO BOX 5612, Elmwood Station
Berkeley, CA 94705
mindfulpeacebuilding@gmail.com
Support Mindful Peacebuilding Everywhere!
Practice The Art of Mindful Living
Embody The Energy Of Peace
Cultivate The Energy Of Mindfulness
Develop Mindfulness-Based Peacebuilding Skills
Engage In Mindfulness-Based Community Service And Public Action
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