Visualizing Peace
What we can do to heal our troubled world
Hi everyone,
This was one of the most popular posts of the past year for a reason. We all want the same thing: peace.
May today’s updated repost and one-minute healing meditation help remind us that there is something we can do every day to bring about harmony in a troubled world.
Updated from the original post of October 16, 2023
Exactly six months ago today I had the privilege of visiting both Israel and the Palestinian-occupied West Bank. It was the highlight of our 5-month trip around the world.
My takeaway: the love on both sides of the fence was palpable. So was the tension. Layer upon layer of tensions built up over centuries of enmity. After witnessing three of the largest religious traditions overlap, coexist, and worship as I did on that day, it is impossible to deny our human connection. We are all one.
Given what we’ve been seeing in the news for months now — all that heartbreaking, soul-crushing, unspeakable horror — simply boggles the mind. All that pain and suffering and damage is beyond imagining.
What I can offer is this:
A few images that tell a different story — photos that reveal the powerful feminine undercurrents that I experienced when I was in the area six months ago.
A simple meditation for releasing centuries’ old patterns of trauma and conflict — for anyone who cares to join me.
And for those of you who need more than visuals to make sense of the senseless,
A heartfelt message for humanity
May today’s offerings help to remind us that no matter how awful, unjust, or hopeless the circumstance — out in the world or at home — there is nothing that love and spaciousness cannot do to bring us closer to healing and lasting peace.
Ahhh 🙏🏼💕
Four Images of Peace
Photos by Stephanie Bennett Vogt
Below are four images that capture three remarkable moments — all of which took place in one day, on April 16, 2023.
Prayer. The women’s side of the Western Wall in Jerusalem. They don’t call it the Wailing Wall for nothing.
Gratitude. What you’re seeing is a part of a gratitude prayer that I scribbled on a piece of paper and placed into one of the crevices of the Western Wall. It reads: “Thank you for showing the world how to replace fear with LOVE and for changing the paradigm in our lifetime.”
It’s hard to tell from this photo, but the crevices are tiny and jammed full. When my folded-up paper wouldn’t fit anywhere, a woman deep in prayer next to me stopped, found a chair for me to stand on, and held it while I searched for a spot higher up. I was a weeping mess. Her kindness meant the world to me in that moment. Impossible to describe is the feeling of lightness and clarity that I felt as I walked away from that wall. Cleansed is the word that comes to mind.
Birth. Sitting in the exact spot where Jesus was born in Bethlehem was another transporting moment that I did not see coming. It wasn’t until our Palestinian guide led us into spontaneous singing of Silent Night that I completely lost it.
I made this photo in a rare moment when the crush of people had suddenly vanished and I found myself alone in this tiny womb-like space.
Death and rebirth. I captured this moment of peace at the Church of the Holy Spulchre, the site where Jesus was prepared for burial and placed after his death.
What you can’t see (or hear) is the haunting Muslim call to prayer that led up to this moment; heartfelt sounds that filled the air and accompanied us as we snaked through the Via Dolorosa, the grueling path that Jesus took in his final hour.
One-minute healing meditation
Note: this visualization can be applied to any area that has suffered or is suffering from centuries of conflict and trauma, be it in the Middle East, Ukraine, or any region that is or has been in crisis. Use this practice to cultivate spaciousness.*
Close your eyes. Take an easy breath in and a slow, emptying breath out. Bring your awareness to your heart space. Allow the compassion and love that radiates from it to infill you.
Direct that love outwards to areas and beings affected by war or conflict in____ [fill in the blank]. Imagine this love soaking deep below the root source of the centuries-old layers of discord and polarization.
Now imagine this same energy filtering upwards through these layers, inviting it to act as a continuous healing agent and harmonizing balm going forward. Surround the area with more love and golden light. Notice your breathing (has it changed?) Repeat again tomorrow and keep breathing.
A message for humanity by Rabbi Rami Shapiro
“I watched a video of an Israeli mother clutching her baby to her chest as she ran for shelter while Hamas bombed her neighborhood in Ashkelon. I watched a video of a Palestinian mother clutching her baby to her chest as she ran for shelter while the IDF bombed her neighborhood in Gaza. If not for the labels on the screen telling me who was who, I could not tell these women and their babies apart…
If you want to choose a side, side with the mothers clutching their babies and running for shelter. If you want to choose a worldview, choose the nonzero world of “all of us together.” Any other choice perpetuates the trauma and brutality we call human civilization.”
—Excerpt of Rabbi Rami Shapiro's Statement on the Israel-Hamas War, Spirituality and Health Magazine
For his full statement, click HERE.
A word about reposts
In my experience with clearing journeys, there are benefits to circling back around: revisiting a concept, idea, or tool that may have inspired (or even mystified) us. As we change, so does our outlook and our ability to take in information in a new way. May that be so with these reposts.
If you’re enjoying these visual recaps, please share, like, restack… and help us grow this spacious energy.
