“To feel the problems of our world is to know its suffering, but this requires compassionate “response-ability.” If we fail to address the world’s collective trauma with clarity and compassion, we imperil the survival of our children and our children’s children—and countless other species.”

Thomas Hübl

Dear Michael,

I have spent many sleepless nights in the past few weeks. With 32 wars raging on our planet, I feel overwhelmed with grief, sadness, and anger. But I will not numb myself nor turn away. There’s something in me that knows the way I meet the chaos, terror, and destruction will not only shape my life but impact everyone I meet and touch. I don’t know what to do with these turbulent sensations and emotions that move through me or how to stop the madness. I do know if I don’t feel it, I can only react from what I know from the past, and what is needed right now is a deep presence and recognition that the wars and terror outside me are also happening inside me - inside all of us - and the only way we can come up with an alternative, a new future, is to feel it all. Because we are all deeply connected, and what happens to any of us happens to all of us.

Don't search for anything except peace. Try to calm the mind. 

Everything else will come on its own.

Baba Hari Das

Anger, hatred, and revenge will only bring more of the same. The real challenge is to find the “inner peace which transcends all understanding.” How can we find the harmony and calmness of body, mind, and spirit, no matter the circumstances? When we try to kill the beast inside or outside, it will only grow. Like Homer and the poisonous water snake Hydra, every time he cut the snake's head off, two more grew back. Each time we kill our “enemy,” we will have to meet his children sometime in the foggy future of reciprocity. We live in a complex system where everything is connected, and every action creates a reaction. There is no separation in nature, only in the minds of men.

Peace is present right here and now, in ourselves and in everything we do and see. 

Every breath we take, every step we take, can be filled with peace, joy, and serenity. 

The question is whether or not we are in touch with it. We need only to be awake, 

alive in the present moment.

Thich Nhat Hanh 

Cultivating the inner peace that is our path to outer peace does not mean that we condone the violence, terror, and brutality of those who would do us harm. The challenge is to look beneath the surface at the history, conditions, and trauma that led to the unimaginable cruelty that is so pervasive in our world. When we point the finger of blame at those who would hurt us, four more point back to our ancestors and all the places where love was replaced by fear. Peace is love in action, and it starts with healing the ancient traumas, hurts, and neglect of ourselves and those who have come before. Hurt people, hurt people!

I hope you will join me in meditation, prayer, and deep contemplation on the nature of peace and that which is calling us to evolve personally and collectively to a new level of love, compassion, and vision of what could be…

With love and peace in my heart,

Michael

This Month on

WE Earth Radio

A Conversation for

Peace and Awakening

LIVE TRAUMA HEALING CIRCLES

WITH MICHAEL STONE

Upcoming Events with Michael

Dear Ones,

I regret that I needed to postpone the online and live Relational Intimacy workshop.

I have been so busy with private clients and the Integration Circles, which are now full, I need some space to replenish from overdoing!

I'm going on a retreat with my teacher Thomas Hubl next week and I will look at rescheduling when I return. My deep apologies for those of you who had your heart set on coming. I hope you will understand.

With love and blessings,

Michael

Book of the Month

Being Peace

by Thich Nhat Hanh

Being Peace is the seminal founding work by Zen Master and Nobel Peace Prize nominee Thich Nhat Hanh. With a new introduction by Jack Kornfield and the first update since its release over fifteen years ago, this eloquent meditation on "being peace in order to make peace" is more relevant than ever. A book for everyone concerned about the state of the world and the quality of our lives, it has lost none of its timeliness since it was first published in 1987. It is filled with practical suggestions on how to create a more peaceful world "right in the moment we are alive." Contains Thich Nhat Hanh's key practices, including a guide to the practice of reconciliation which has become a peacemaking tool in many other religious traditions.

Video of the Month

Love Song: "One day" 3,000 Jews & Muslims blend their Voices together. A Song of Hope.

Matthew Paul Miller, stage name Matisyahu, is a Jewish reggae singer. At this concert in Haifa he asked 3,000 Muslims and Jews to gather and learn the song "One Day" in less than an hour. Not only that, they learned to sing and harmonize lyrics in three different languages, the resulting concert is a stunning spectacle of unity and beauty. This means achieving unity among human beings regardless of race, creed and political divisions. This artist is an envoy of the Light who is giving those of darkness a hard time.

The video is moving. This is how we win. We are all under the same sun.

4 minutes

About Michael Stone

Michael Stone is a spiritual author, mentor, shamanic practitioner, radio host, producer, and trauma integration facilitator who co-creates individual and group environments and experiences that support people in transcending the myth of separation, and experiencing deep and profound interconnection with others and all of life. He has been teaching and leading experiential events, classes, teleseminars and workshops on Organizational Development, Embodied Shamanism, Moving Meditation, Mysticism, Relational Intimacy, Personal Growth, Trauma Integration and Spiritual Fulfillment for over 40 years. www.WellofLight.com

Soul Remembering and Restoration: Rediscovering Our Essential Goodness

• Somatic Trauma Integration Facilitation
• Group & Couples Counselling
• Movement & Meditation Experiences

To meet the financial and emotional challenges of our time Michael is now offering a sliding scale for therapeutic sessions online & in person.

If you are interested in working with Michael you can set up a 15 minute introductory call here.

For more information click here.

Poetry Corner

My desperate and sad prayer

I…

I pray…

I pray for Israel.

I pray for Palestine.

I pray for all of us now.

And if you condemn me for taking sides,

or judge me for not taking sides,

then maybe you don’t understand

the depths of this love.

Because love itself is the prayer.

And the one who prays.

And the longing and the light.

And the darkness and the answer.

And so I pray for you too.

For all of your conflicting parts.

For all the children fighting within you.

And I pray for you to know

the Consciousness prior to identity.

I pray for you to know

the I Am itself.

Before I am a Palestinian.

Before I am an Israeli.

Before I am Jewish, Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, or an atheist.

Before division itself.

Before any notion of God or her absence.

Before time.

Before all of this began.

Before the world,

the joy and the sorrow of living.

Before territory and history.

I am what you are.

I am your rage, your grief, your loneliness.

Your fear. Your vulnerable heart.

Your powerlessness. Your shaking.

And through these non-dual eyes,

perhaps we can finally love each other.

In spite of our beliefs.

In spite of our ancient rage and our lust for revenge.

In spite of religion.

In spite of what the holy books

tell us to think.

You are my brother.

My sister.

My child.

My mother.

My father.

I pray for love to permeate the world.

Before it’s too late.

I pray for awakening.

I pray for Palestine.

I pray for Israel.

Before it’s too late.

I pray for all the children.

All the babies.

All the mothers and fathers.

Sisters and brothers.

Friends and enemies.

I pray for the end of hostilities.

Before it’s too late.

I pray for all those who are scared right now.

I pray that my small, sad prayer helps in some way.

Even in some small way.

Even in some tiny way.

I pray for you.

I pray for me.

I pray for us.

I pray…

I…

- Jeff Foster

Go to the Limits of Your Longing

God speaks to each of us as he makes us,

then walks with us silently out of the night.

These are the words we dimly hear:

You, sent out beyond your recall,

go to the limits of your longing.

Embody me.

Flare up like a flame

and make big shadows I can move in.

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.

Just keep going. No feeling is final.

Don’t let yourself lose me.

Nearby is the country they call life.

You will know it by its seriousness.

Give me your hand.



Rainer Maria Rilke



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