Let's change the world this week -- in our spare time.

If in our daily life we can smile, if we can be peaceful and happy, not only we, but everyone will profit from it. This is the most basic kind of peace work. --Thich Nhat Hanh

This quote by the Buddhist monk, Thich Nhat Hanh, really touched me. I found myself coming back to it over and again this week.

It all started last Saturday when I drove by a group of peace activists standing in the rain outside the farmer's market in Greenfield, Massachusetts. They held signs and just stood quietly, a silent witness to their longing for peace. Many of them were my age -- they'd "been there, done that" before during the Vietnam war - and here they/we are again.

One of the signs said "Make Peace".

The war has been troubling me again. War troubles me. The feeling of helplessness I have in the face of it troubles me. So I vote in a particular way, and send money to causes that believe as I do, nd write letters to decision-makers. And I pray. But I am nagged by the feeling that it isn't enough. How do *I* "make peace"?

And then along comes Thich Naht Hanh and he tells me to find my peace, my personal peace -- and that finding it will be an important part of peace work. And, I think he is right. Unless my heart and soul are at peace, I cannot think or see clearly. I can be of less meaningful help.

Then I thought of a hymn I recall singing:

Let there be peace on earth
And let it begin with me

Imagine if we all did that -- all found the place and circumstance that gave us the most personal peace, and we created that place for ourselves as often as possible. It is something we can do in the odd moments, in the seams of the day.

If we focus on it in meditation, we can even have it when we are not there. If, for example, you are at your most peaceful when at the ocean, meditating about the ocean, and remembering the peace you felt, can bring that peace back to you. You can find the rhythm and let it flow through you again.

Or maybe, that peace can come by us making room for it to arrive more often. If you are most at peace while writing -- why not write more?

Being at peace with ourselves quiets the clatter that keeps us from being in the world in a peaceful way. It helps us know what to do next, and gives rise to acts of kindness.

Being at peace, real peace, shuts out those feelings that get us and the world in trouble.

Think about it this week. Here are some bloggers who talk about what makes them "most at peace".

Mothermari recalls time with her Grandmother as times of deepest peace.

Grandmother Leah (or Lee as everyone called her) was a wonderful cook. She was the master of fried chicken, and the wizard of cherry pie. Each presented to me every year as one of her gifts to me on my birthday.
She would begin early in the morning preparing the birthday feast by wearing her best appron that always had tucked inside one of the pockets a dainty handkerchief. She seemed to moved around the kitchen effortlessly as she prepared each dish. The smells of the birthday treat would drift through the house as she started cooking.

BonnieRose speaks of the serenely quiet moments in her search for moments of peace.

I crave the quiet, the prayer times, the meditation, the stillness of just being alone with myself. It is during these times when I am the most -- at peace.

Christine finds peace in an unexpected place:

I’ve always believed that each person has a certain place in the world where their heart feels most at home. The world could be falling down around you and you wouldn’t even notice. There’s a comfort when you walk on certain territory, just knowing that there’s nowhere on this earth that God wants you to be rather than where you are at that moment.
Right in the midst of poverty and lost people and orphans and street boys and a language that I can’t wrap my mind around for the life of me…this is my heart’s home: Ethiopia.
This is where I feel most at peace…but at the same time, I’m still unsettled.

Connie finds peace while cross stitching:

I am most at peace when I am stitching, listening to good music, with my faithful little companion at my feet. No matter what is going on in my life, stitching makes me feel much more calm and peaceful. The stress and cares of the day just melt away.

Angela decided on med school vs law school based on which one made her feel the most at peace when she thought about it.

Annette is clear about what brings her peace :

I’ve found that I feel most at peace when I’m near the ocean. Something about the ebb and flow, the constant cycle of its soothing sound. The feel of the sand, shifting under my bare feet. I also feel the most bliss when I’m warm. I’ve visited cold states and countries and have discovered that cold weather makes me tense and irritable---and only a half step away from homicidal.

In a world so obsessed by the large scale gesture, it seems almost foolish to suggest that something I do or you do can change the world. But if *we* do it, then maybe it can.

We mirror to the outside world, reflecting outward what is happening in our inside world. We impact the world of people in our lives based on what is happening inside us. Everyone we touch in a day, a week, a year, is affected in some way by whether or not we are at peace.

Maybe it is a memory of a beloved relative, or the call of meaningful work in Ethiopia, or the sea, or writing or stitching or any number of things that brings you real peace. Get quiet enough to think about that -- where or under what circumstances are you most at peace? Try imagining how you might bring more of that into your life this week. It will energize you, fulfill you, and will improve the world, one person at a time.

It will "Make Peace".