“Almost all of us long for peace and freedom”
– Aldous Huxley Island, 1962

In December 2024, Syria went through a peaceful revolution and continues building peace: the interim government is committed to people and diversity, integrating all groups in the government; rebel factions are disarming. Amazing. It starts well (despite hurdles) and I wish further peace for them.
It’s a fantastic example that “Peace we can”, Peace we must.
If not, war, death, suffering, destruction and waste continue.

Here is a song to align with the Peace vibration while you read on: Om Shanti Shanti Shanti Om.
Shanti (Peace) is said 3 times because peace is inside, between people and globally.

Find the peace inside

I want peace for the world. Everyday, I look at this flag that invites me to make my own life peaceful first. I realized that I indeed had internal conflicts, voices in my head, defenses and attacks, hurt.

These wars inside us create stress, sickness and project bad energies, therefore wars outside. Anxiety, negative (self) talk, addictions or bad habits, excuse, judgments, justification… Do you recognize any of these? I do!! Inside me, in society and in international conflicts!

Instead, I choose to be relaxed, present, living consciously, creating the life I want, with love always.

Becoming aware of my inner voices, fears and ego allowed me to let them go. Letting go of trauma, identifying thoughts as thoughts, quietening the mind, loving myself; all bring calm, happiness and peace.

Healthy alkaline nutrition, meditation, reiki, 3-deep-breath, time in nature and caring for the garden, sun salutations, gratitude, practicing presence and journaling are all helping me on my journey to inner peace.

Away judgement, need to justify, to defend… Welcome love, expanding love, awareness, compassion, acceptance, openness, connection, calm, beingness and nature appreciation. Peace.

I think it is a life purpose to find peace, it’s ongoing. Peace feels great. When in peace, I shine peace, share peace, pray peace. It’s personal growth. And the flag says it brings peace to the Earth!

I wish you enjoy finding peace and look forward to the peaceful snowball effect we have together. Florence

Love Water: I hold a cup of water with appreciation, love. Dr Emoto has shown that water “records” the environment so my water becomes love and gratitude and then I drink it, filling myself with love, becoming love. Crazy or not, it feels great and works with me!

“What would love do now?” is a question I often ask myself, with gratifying results. From Neale Donald Walsh Conversation with God.

I recently did the Teal Swan Love Yourself free course and it changed my life, thank you, highly recommended.

Loving myself brings PEACE inside.

International powers

The world is not in Peace, it is over-armed and soaked in violence and huge guns on media, movies, gaming and sadly in real in many countries, cutting short real lives and devastating real landscapes.

Armament industries are financed by governments (people’s tax money) who infuse the world with fear to justify it, making the world more dangerous.

Armament industry provides jobs and huge profits to financial portfolios. Wars increase the GDP with all the business generated to make the weapons then to repair. So warfaring is an economic boost.

Yet we can realize in one instant that Growth-growth-growth is unsustainable, it is exploiting and polluting the planet, colonizing people, draining life, mental health and health.
A way out is to doing / going / buying less.
What we do, we do sustainably: go circular and local, low carbon, healthy, increasing resilience, aiming at having enough, within planetary boundaries. We, all of us, at our level, can foster the shift and mitigate the effects by sharing.

There is no need to continue war to keep the economy going, there is a lot to repair, from the wars and from increasing climate change disasters;
There is a lot of work to relocate, innovate, plant, restore…
Governments can accompany the transition into a low carbon regenerating resilient society, with subventions to foster the conversion of unsustainable industries into sustainable beneficial ventures. For example, an armaments plant starts building electric civil machinery, a farmer becomes a biodiversity steward…

Provocation, tit for tat, justification, fear culture, bullying and blackmailing, to pure cruelty… Resulting in so many death and victims.

Several leaders of the world behave like nasty kids, bullies, below-the-belt thinking. I feel compassion for all, they hold so much fear and look so hurt, by generations of wars, indoctrination and revenge.

I wish leaders soon have the realization that peace can be chosen every day, a peace that is fair, durable. Steps are taken. More effort is required.

Asking people what they need; listening; supporting; finding ways to live in harmony together… Talking to each other, sharing, realizing we are all humans who love, choosing peace over further death, creating reconciliation, this is the mission of the Israeli Palestinian Bereaved Families for Peace. It takes courage, change, vulnerability, that’s bravery. This group activities brings peace inside and between participants and hopes for wider peaceful resolutions.

I think citizens’ assemblies are great conduits for understanding and creating solutions for the highest good of all involved. They are well-suited to rise above conflicts of interest and complex issues with trade-offs and values-driven dilemmas. In New Zealand, Max Rashbrooke is fostering the practice of citizens’ jury.

So there are solutions and I continue to hope that the leaders of the world, the wealthy, the influencers, everyone really, will shift, change the way we do things and invest for the greater good, as ultimately, it benefits all.

At the occasion of the International Peace Week in September 2024, I wrote an open letter for Peace to NZ Prime Minister and Defense Minister. Then made it a petition to stay peaceful and nuclear free.
(Update August 2025: The petition was sent with more than 70 signatures to Christopher Luxon, Judith Collins, Winston Peters and David Seymour on the 28th July 2025 🕊)

We are one mind shift away from peace and all it requires is love, which we all have plenty of. So I continue hoping and holding the space for peace, always. With peace, our world will be safer, better connected with one another and nature, equitable, harmonious, happier… what’s not to love?!

Does this essay on peace helps you or brings you hope? Let me know!

Love love love 🌸Shanti shanti shanti

In New Zealand, Mindful Money helps people to direct their funds towards social and environmentally beneficial outcomes.

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Peacemaking is reconciling people. Extracts from the Courage for Peace, by Louise Diamond.