Reply #22: You're welcome ...

[gleaner]

I'm glad I could help out. I'm not judging myself in the way that you think. It's a Quaker thing. We're not evangelical, but sometimes it helps me to explain why I do things. We live according to certain core values. It is a very individualistic faith. Two Quakers probably won't agree on how to interpret things in exactly the same way, ever. We are encouraged to question. Question ourselves. Seek out the things in ourselves which conflict with the values we have chosen or which have chosen us. One of our core values is pacifism. We live in peace and reach out in peace to others. We try to solve our problems with others by conflict resolution. This has to start within yourself. If you can't solve your own conflicts, you can't reach out to others to try to start a discussion on why peace is better than war, and gentleness is better than violence. There are different shades of belief and resolution on how to live pacifism. For instance some Quakers will not use violence to defend themselves or their family members.

On using violence to save myself, I don't know, but I'm not there yet for family members. I would use violence to save someone I love from being harmed or killed. I do admire people like Tom Fox, my avatar who was captured while trying to help Iraqis attain reparations for the harm Bush was doing to them, and to bring attention to what was happening to the civilians of Iraq who had never harbored terrorists and who really had no say in what Saddam did. They were however subject to an unspeakable level of violence and attrition which Fox and other peace church members from the CPO wanted to bring to the attention of the world. Fox was captured with other members of his group and held hostage. His daughter appeared on TV to say that he had been aware that something like being taken hostage or worse might happen, but he had to go. It was not the first time he had taken such a risk to help others. If the worst happened, he asked her to tell of his wish that no violence be used to try to free him or save his life. It must have been very hard for her to do what she did, but she adhered to his wishes and would not comment when he was beheaded and the video was passed around the world. I would like to think that I would have that much courage to make great sacrifices for what I believed in without costing another human life. I don't know if I do yet, so I continue to question. Questioning is what we are supposed to do.

So to draw it together, I was working in a place which funded "Defense" spending. As long as I did that I could not live in truth, which is another of our values. So I had a dialogue going with myself all the time until after I left and I could finally see clearly how to come to peace with what I had done and why. Then I was able to stop worrying at it and let it go. We all do things we regret and we all wish we could change them, but you can't change the past, so we have to go on from where we find ourselves and be truthful with ourselves and others about what we have learned. Telling the truth is another core value called "plain speak." It is why we affirm instead of swearing oaths. If you swear an oath in court, for instance you are acknowledging that there are two levels of truth. There aren't so we affirm that we are telling the truth as we know it. Later on if you realize you are rationalizing or denying the truth to serve yourself you stop doing it and learn again.

It is not a painful or forced process. My meeting practices silent worship which means we have no clergy. We sit in silence looking into ourselves and hoping that we can feel the God within us leading us to what we need to be doing to grow in our lives and come nearer to living in kindness and leaving only a small footprint upon the earth. We discuss what we feel needs changing in society, but we don't seek power. We are in the world but not of it. It may not seem so, but it is a very peaceful and nourishing dynamic. We recognize that it is not right for everyone. People who need us will find us. Otherwise they have their own truth which is equal in value to ours, just as people and cultures are equal to each other in our eyes. Everyone has a piece of the truth. No one has the whole truth. We need to learn that from each other and maybe someday we will understand ourselves, each other, and our global community a little better.

Any motion that you take, even if it is having the thoughts we are discussing from your post is motion. Ideas move swiftly and often translate into something more tangible to improve the world we live in. If others reading what you wrote get the same idea, then you have done something better than you knew.

I'm not preaching at you, really. I don't like it when people do that to me. I'm just trying to explain that what I am doing and thinking about myself is not harsh and unbending or painful. It is part of a growth process I have chosen freely and have grown very attached to. ;)