Please copy this and spread it around, we depend on YOU to spread the word.
I know this is a lot to read, but I ask you to please read it through. By deciding to participate, you may just be the person that people will say changed their life. Think about how a large demonstration could change the way our leaders make decisions. If we start teaching our children by example, instead of just saying things and not following through ourselves, maybe, just maybe, they will understand the importance of their actions and deeds. It is a simple way to teach our children that we do stand for living in a peaceful world. That humans, as a species, can learn from their mistakes, and live in balance with the planet, instead of destroying everything we touch. If we can instill that profit from corrupt means will be a loss for mankind, and endanger our planet's ability to enable us to survive, then perhaps they will have lives that will be worth living in the future. You've heard it all before, but haven't chosen to act. I am making it so easy for you to set an example, if you don't, you will have no one to blame but yourself. It's about time we all participate in the lessons of the way the web of life works. It is the same as we all learned in school. You take away one piece of the web, and the whole thing will collapse. It is a truth that has been taught but ignored through our own greed and selfishness. Lets start with a simple act that will help us realize how easy it is to make that change.
May Peace Prevail On Earth,
Don
Morris aka "Peaceguy"
The foolish human who started this.
Peaceguy's Prayer
May the
people on this planet be changed.
Changed from hatred to love,
Changed
from greed to giving,
Changed from selfishness to selflessness,
Changed
from apathy to action,
Changed from jealousy to joy over someone's
accomplishments,
Changed from intolerance to acceptance,
Changed from
being destructive to being constructive,
Changed from fighting to
peace,
Changed from killing to protecting life,
Changed from censorship
to freedom,
Changed from ignorance to education,
Changed from fearing
our differences to rejoicing our variety.
May we each take it upon
ourselves to feed the hungry, cure the sick,
house the homeless, educate
the illiterate, love the unloved,
compete to do the right thing instead of
winning at any cost,
make heros that teach our children to
make the
world a better place instead of glorifying violence and war,
stand up and
speak out against things that are wrong
instead of sitting back and waiting
for someone else,
demand honesty from our governments,
demand honesty
from ourselves.
May we each take responsibility for our own actions
and realize that by refusing to change ourselves,
we condone all the evils
in the world.
If one person changes they teach others by example,
who
in turn change and teach more,
one person becomes as a pebble rolling down
a mountain,
picking up more pebbles as it continues,
becoming an
avalanche of change.
It can happen, it must happen, it will
happen.
To make this prayer work, you have to change yourself.
Copyright 1997 Don Morris. Feel free to use this anywhere and any
place. All I ask is to reference this website if you do.
Here is my
pebble to start this avalanche,.... hopefully you will add your pebble
and
together we can demonstrate how easy it is to make a grassroots movement
work.
A few years back I had a vision of creating a non-religious,
non- governmental, world inclusive, grassroots movement for a day to promote
peace. I am no rocket scientist, I am just a regular person who goes about my
daily tasks to survive in this world,... just like everyone else. I had the
vision but no direction, and did my best to make the demonstration easy. But I
failed because people look for some kind of director, some kind of organization
to lead them and tell them what to do. I failed to realize that petitions are a
dime a dozen, and concerts and large gatherings usually take some kind of
organizing to pull off and corporate sponsors and all the usual payments and
permits associated with it all. This was something I just didn't have the
ability or time to do. Although, I spent all my spare time working on it, I
didn't have the ingredients to make it happen. There are thousands of media
outlets to contact and they want details for each place and times and all the
associated media. All I have is a website. It was discouraging to me to see how
difficult it was to put something like this together. I stagnated and became
depressed. I didn't realize the way to make this happen. One morning I sat
typing a reply to an email and all of a sudden my vision was made complete. I
needed to ask for help. Your help. So for this year, 2003, and every year
after, World Peace Day, November 17th, here is what, I hope, will empower us to
make our leaders, and our future generations, take notice. This is the only way
to really make terrorists, politicians and world leaders take notice that THE
PEOPLE want peace! Military might and aggression have been proven time and time
again not to do anything but create a world of fear, violence, and destruction.
Weapons of mass destruction are a deterrent, but the only way to real peace is
through negotiation and resolving the issues that created the problems. By
gathering together we provide the pebble to start the avalanche towards
peace.
First of all I want to make sure everyone realizes this starts
with you. There is no "organization" or corporation that is coordinating this.
There is no official logo, no corporate sponsorship, no donations or money
needed. It is a grassroots effort to make the day happen. If you are in
business and want to use it to make money by selling T-shirts or trinkets, it
makes no difference to me. As long as people don't think that the money gained
comes back to peaceday.org. Use your conscience as your guide. I want people to
know that money is really not needed for this grassroots effort, it is a
display of people wanting to live in a world of peace. Everything is up to you
how you want to spend this day. I will provide simple ideas for you, but after
that, you decide how much or little you think you can give to this effort. The
only instructions are,.....pray, focus, or meditate for peace. There is no set
time table, it will be all 24 hours of November 17, 2003. There is no printed
media other than this web page, you are free to create your own. The only thing
"official" will be peaceday.org and what are on its pages about this event.
There will be no central place where all sites planned are posted, just these
web boards, so, if you
don't see a place, in the area where you live, posting information about it, it
will be up to YOU to create one. If you can't set something up, find a few
people WHEREVER YOU ARE, take a few moments to hold hands in a circle and
meditate together for a few minutes. It is all up to you. If you can, make it a
public place that is open 24 hours a day, preferably with a shelter from the
weather. It can be a religious place but must allow anyone, even other faiths,
to use it. I view the whole world as being sacred, but if indigenous peoples
want to have their gathering in a sacred place, that is up to them, again I ask
that if it is a sacred place for you, you should also make sure you allow
anyone to join you. So, if your sacred place is too sacred for others, choose
another spot. If you live in a small city, one large gathering place would be
fine, but since this is grassroots, in large cities it would be preferable to
choose several areas to make it easy for people to stop by during the day. This
doesn't have to be a huge concert type venue, in fact, it is much better to
just provide people with a place to gather together for the common cause of
world peace. Make it simple for people to gather and pray or meditate for
peace. You have to understand that the more things you add to your event, the
more the focus will be on the event, and away from the focus of world peace. It
may be that only a few people stop this year, but the next time we do this it
will be more. This will work if we all work together. There is plenty of time
to pull it off. It is simple enough that ANYONE can do it. Be the pebble in
your community to get the avalanche rolling. It is not a competition, it is not
intended to take over any other proclaimed peace days, or to promote anything
other than a quiet meditation for peace. No donations, no money is needed, just
whatever time and materials you want to donate to your own effort to promote
it. Word of mouth works too, that is free.
Here are some simple suggestions to get you started.
Ask the religious head of your church to tailor the week of November 17th around peace on earth. While this peace day isn't intended to be a religious gathering, it certainly will not exclude religion either. It may be as simple as gathering in the parking lot holding hands and praying for peace. I encourage whatever you decide to do as long as you invite anyone who wants to participate with you, no matter what faith. It would be even better if several religions can find a place to join together in meditation and prayer without a religious service of any denomination. This is not about religion it is a demonstration for world peace.
If you have a neighborhood place with
easy access to parking, with cover in case of inclement weather, that can be
open to the public for any period of time, but , preferably for 24 hours, call
now and see if it can be reserved for this day. But, I want to stress the
simpleness by stating that even a 24 hour store parking lot where a small area
can be set up for people to be together is fine. Parks with pavilions are
great, but so is a place of work where the employees get together. This is a
demonstration for world peace no matter what the setting. The only thing that
can stop you from participating is you.
If you already have an event
scheduled for this day, include a meditation or prayer or moment of silence so
people are made aware of the significance of the day's goal and can
participate. You can use folded origami cranes as your design
theme.
Here is a suggestion of what to say.
Before the opening kickoff, sermon,
speech, concert,.... please join us in a brief moment of silence to help in
today's effort to promote world peace. We ask that you pray, meditate, or
respect our wish to focus on the hope that we may one day live in a world where
there is no need for violence to accomplish our goals. Where we don't have to
live with the fear of war. Where people accept each other's differences without
judgement and we all respect each other's goals and dreams for a peaceful
life.
To promote World Peace Day November 17th you
can,...
The
Leonid meteor showers fall on and around this day. You can go star gazing and
make a wish for peace with each falling star you see.
Send this information out to the local
media in your area and tell your friends and relatives what you plan to do.
Use email, phone calls, faxes, and information on your webpages.
Include it
in newsletters, magazines, or your daily newspaper.
Ask your government
leaders to help,...after all it is these people that we want to reach.
Tell
your religious leaders about it, tell them how important it is for us to set an
example for our youth to live by.
Kids, tell your parents, even if the
gathering is only your family it will make a difference.
Encourage the place
you work to place it in company mail or place a link to it
or information
about it in their advertizements or web pages.
There are no donations
involved
and it is simply asking people to focus on world peace for the day
so there SHOULDN'T be any objections.
Please do not spam this out on the
web.
Instead, encourage the grassroots effort to promote this the right way
by only emailing people that you know,
asking that they in turn only send
this to others that they know. Please respect other's wishes to not be
spammed..
You can make a simple flyer with your event location, a brief
description of what we are doing, date, and time, and post it on bulletin
boards and areas where people will have a chance to see it. You can hand
leaflet your church or movies when they let out, or other events such as craft
shows and concerts.
If you are a reporter or work at a television, or
radio station ask your editor / program manager to include it in the broadcast
for the day. Help promote gatherings by giving event information out. It is up
to you to promote it as much or as little as you wish. You may even make a
special moment where your news people gather holding hands and make a statement
to encourage World Peace. It is time to set the example and not wait for
others, so, ask that people join you in a focus for world peace.
Tell
people to drive with their headlights on, during the day, or wear a white
ribbon, to show their support for world peace.
Promote doing a random
act of kindness this one day, use your imagination!
If you are a
musician you can have a sing a long with your audience
of
Give Peace A Chance or whatever Peace Song or poem
you want to do.
You can have a candlelight vigil, making sure of course
that you take into consideration all the safety rules such a task requires.
You can have an origami
crane folding event and provide the paper and instructions asking that
people hang them in a visible place after they leave to show their desire for
world peace.
If you are a school,
folding origami cranes to
display outside the school for that weekend would be a good project for kids.
You can make artwork to display in local store windows. You can lead up to the
day, the week before, with speakers and work shops on subjects we are all
concerned about focusing on the problem of violence in schools. Take the lead
in telling what you are planning by posting it on our web boards.
I am
sure I will get many more suggestions as the word spreads of what we are doing,
if you think you have one,
please post it on one of the
web boards I have
provided.
You can place a white ribbon on your website and link it
back to this page to help promote this project. Make a link below the picture
say "In support of world peace, November 17, 2003. Or you can make your own. Be
creative!
May Peace Prevail On
Earth,
Don Morris Founder and Director
The foolish human who started
this.
email- For comments, suggestions,etc
peaceguy@peaceday.org
please put
WPDnov17 in the subject line
Snail mail- For comments, suggestions,
etc.
World Peace Day November 17, inc.
(A non-profit corporation)
P.O. Box 565245
Miami, Florida 33256-5245
Special Thanks to Trish Hilliard of Zofo Graphic Designs
for the background design,...
GIVE PEACE A CHANCE
PROJECT
Back to www.peaceday.org