Peace on Earth, and Peace in Us
"Courage - (n., v.) - to tell the story of who you are with your whole heart."
- Brene Brown
- Brene Brown
"Let there be peace on Earth, and let it begin with me... Let there be peace on Earth, the peace that was meant to be. To take each moment, and live each moment, in peace eternally...."
These are the words of a carol that is mighty popular around my hometown of Bloomington, Indiana. Or, at least, I've been singing it for about a decade now. Starting in Indiana University Children's Choir, and singing it loud through high school Holiday Concerts. Now, when my closest friends and I - who all grew up together - get together for our annual caroling party, this is one of the songs we sing. It doesn't have the most satisfying melody. In our rankings of which carols are our favorites, this carol is oft forgotten. However, this year, as the holiday season has worn on, this song keeps getting stuck in my head, begging to be hummed.
2017 has been a tough year. From natural disasters, to man-made ones, the thing that has saddened me the most has been the ways in which I've seen friends and family divide themselves. Everywhere, we are fighting. It's disheartening.
Long before this year, in order to keep my head and keep myself out of unnecessary arguments I always ended up regretting, I stole some originally Buddhist mindfulness practices to implement into my daily life. One of the practices I implement is stepping back from what I am doing or immersed in and looking at what is going on from a place of neutrality, where I am not taking personally the things that people are saying or doing. I do this to practice compassion, and to see people not just as their political viewpoints, but as whole human beings whose thoughts and actions perhaps reflect on life experiences or deeply held beliefs. Whenever I do this, I find that I am less outraged, less ticked off even when people are acting like fools. Taking this moment to not take things personally, to get a different perspective on people's behavior, I can come with compassion to more of my daily life, and to more of my interactions. This, in turn, helps me save my energy for work that I do that actively helps people whose lives are effected by policy changes and by prejudice. It also helps me save my energy for performance (if I spent all that hot air yelling, I'd not have any left for singing, folks).
Back to the Peace carol I mentioned earlier...
I thought about the words of this carol today, and started thinking about what peace really means.
In my mind, there exist two definitions.
1) Peace - (n) - World peace. Where everyone holds hands and sings Kumbayah, and nobody fights, no one goes hungry. Everyone is happy. A dove with an olive leaf in its mouth.
2) Peace - (n, adj.) - A state of being in which I find contentment and confidence, in which I feel safe, in which I feel right.
When I sing the above carol, I think of Peace (1), but I also think about Peace (2). Peace (2) is something I can feel, it's something I have felt before. It's my refuge when I'm over-anxious, when I have confusing emotions. For me, I find it in meditation. I know my Dad finds it in a good book. My mom loves puzzles. My boyfriend like walks in the woods, or time sitting beside a lake or creek. Peace (2) is delicious and reachable.
It's also something that I feel that I and the rest of the world are currently lacking at this moment in time.
Sometimes when thinking on this strange lack of peace in the world, this thought comes - "Duh! We're not feeling peace because we're outraged! Outraged for the state of things! Outraged about what is being done to us, taken from us, and about what we're seeing done to people worse off than us! If we're at peace WE'RE NOT PAYING ATTENTION!"
This thought makes me feel selfish on days when I do feel some peace.
And this doesn't sit well with me.
Not because I don't believe in feeling outraged. Feel yo feelings. I'm not about to push mine down.
This dedication to outrage doesn't sit with me, because I believe that in this season, and in every season, we all deserve peace. People who live without peace live without energy. At my moments of highest anxiety and worry, and at times when I have been the most angry and in crisis - I can accomplish nothing! I cannot help myself, let alone help others. If we are outraged all the time, we will get nothing done. Whatsmore, if we find no peace, no rightness in where we all, it means we haven't counted our blessings - the blessings that are our reasons to fight in the first place. Finding gratitude for our present circumstances can fuel us to fight. It can help us be more courageous, and unlike outrage it won't drain our tanks. It will fill them, and keep re-filling them.
Winter is a time of reflection, and during this time I have the thought that many artists have. It's not a nice one.
I think: "What am I DOING? My field is a bunch of fluffy nonsense! Why be an artist? Why be a performer?! I'm not helping others, and I'm not making a difference in the world."
Ouch.
It hurts to think such things.
I have compassion for this thought, but then I ask myself : "But doesn't art bring you such peace?"
And then I think of all of the times I've spent in total bliss on stage...
As Brutus in Julius Caesar at the Shakespeare's Globe Theater, proving to myself that my 5' 1", 110 lb body could fill a huge, outdoor Elizabethan theater and believably embody the character and spirit of a Roman warrior...
Closing "Spring Awakening," as Ilse, with "A Song of Purple Summer," seeing my whole cast rise around me and sing with their gorgeous voices...
And then I ask myself: "And hasn't your art brought peace to someone's life?"
And I think of the times when I've seen my work make a difference to someone...
Seeing the gratitude in an audience member's eyes as she tearfully told me about how my work in James Bosley's "Fun" made her feel so seen, as a survivor of childhood sexual abuse...
Being thanked by an Iraqi woman for taking the time to hear the story of her family's flight to the United States, and to perform it on stage in the Ivy Tech Storytelling Series...
Being engulfed in hugs from a whole classroom of kids from the Refugee Youth Summer Academy, in New York City, after having taught them Visual Arts and helped them with their English skills during the summer of 2015...
Thinking of all of these things, I once again say "Hell yeah!" to being an artist, and I also start to understand the value of the peace art can create. We all go through struggles in our lives. The world cycles through conflicts and regime changes, and upheavals - man-made or environmental.
In a world like this, peace, in whatever ways we can create it, is a necessity.
Artists bring peace in the form of laughter, in the form of a release of tears. Artists are constantly reminding us in their work that we are not alone. In their saddest and happiest tales, they whisper "Me Too."
On the stage, in the classroom, from the director's chair, I am so happy that I get to find peace, and to create it.
Artists create peace through creating Kinship. We create Kinship between performer and audience member, and between audience members. It is this bonding, this creation of kinship, that, as Father Greg Boyle of Homeboy Industries says in his book "Tattoos on the Heart," 'erases the margins of society..."
This year, when I sing that carol at the piano, with all my friend's surrounding me, I will remember that now, as we venture into 2018, is the perfect time for peace. Peace inside myself. Peace that I'll create for others.
I'll remind myself that peace is not selfish. It's something we all need to cultivate in order to do selfless work.
I'll remind myself that Art is not frivolous. That Art can create peace, through beauty, through kinship.
And I'll remember that Peace cultivated in each of us, even in a world that is not, at the moment, peaceful, may one day help us bring peace on earth.
Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas! Blessed Yule!
Aubrey
These are the words of a carol that is mighty popular around my hometown of Bloomington, Indiana. Or, at least, I've been singing it for about a decade now. Starting in Indiana University Children's Choir, and singing it loud through high school Holiday Concerts. Now, when my closest friends and I - who all grew up together - get together for our annual caroling party, this is one of the songs we sing. It doesn't have the most satisfying melody. In our rankings of which carols are our favorites, this carol is oft forgotten. However, this year, as the holiday season has worn on, this song keeps getting stuck in my head, begging to be hummed.
2017 has been a tough year. From natural disasters, to man-made ones, the thing that has saddened me the most has been the ways in which I've seen friends and family divide themselves. Everywhere, we are fighting. It's disheartening.
Long before this year, in order to keep my head and keep myself out of unnecessary arguments I always ended up regretting, I stole some originally Buddhist mindfulness practices to implement into my daily life. One of the practices I implement is stepping back from what I am doing or immersed in and looking at what is going on from a place of neutrality, where I am not taking personally the things that people are saying or doing. I do this to practice compassion, and to see people not just as their political viewpoints, but as whole human beings whose thoughts and actions perhaps reflect on life experiences or deeply held beliefs. Whenever I do this, I find that I am less outraged, less ticked off even when people are acting like fools. Taking this moment to not take things personally, to get a different perspective on people's behavior, I can come with compassion to more of my daily life, and to more of my interactions. This, in turn, helps me save my energy for work that I do that actively helps people whose lives are effected by policy changes and by prejudice. It also helps me save my energy for performance (if I spent all that hot air yelling, I'd not have any left for singing, folks).
Back to the Peace carol I mentioned earlier...
I thought about the words of this carol today, and started thinking about what peace really means.
In my mind, there exist two definitions.
1) Peace - (n) - World peace. Where everyone holds hands and sings Kumbayah, and nobody fights, no one goes hungry. Everyone is happy. A dove with an olive leaf in its mouth.
2) Peace - (n, adj.) - A state of being in which I find contentment and confidence, in which I feel safe, in which I feel right.
When I sing the above carol, I think of Peace (1), but I also think about Peace (2). Peace (2) is something I can feel, it's something I have felt before. It's my refuge when I'm over-anxious, when I have confusing emotions. For me, I find it in meditation. I know my Dad finds it in a good book. My mom loves puzzles. My boyfriend like walks in the woods, or time sitting beside a lake or creek. Peace (2) is delicious and reachable.
It's also something that I feel that I and the rest of the world are currently lacking at this moment in time.
Sometimes when thinking on this strange lack of peace in the world, this thought comes - "Duh! We're not feeling peace because we're outraged! Outraged for the state of things! Outraged about what is being done to us, taken from us, and about what we're seeing done to people worse off than us! If we're at peace WE'RE NOT PAYING ATTENTION!"
This thought makes me feel selfish on days when I do feel some peace.
And this doesn't sit well with me.
Not because I don't believe in feeling outraged. Feel yo feelings. I'm not about to push mine down.
This dedication to outrage doesn't sit with me, because I believe that in this season, and in every season, we all deserve peace. People who live without peace live without energy. At my moments of highest anxiety and worry, and at times when I have been the most angry and in crisis - I can accomplish nothing! I cannot help myself, let alone help others. If we are outraged all the time, we will get nothing done. Whatsmore, if we find no peace, no rightness in where we all, it means we haven't counted our blessings - the blessings that are our reasons to fight in the first place. Finding gratitude for our present circumstances can fuel us to fight. It can help us be more courageous, and unlike outrage it won't drain our tanks. It will fill them, and keep re-filling them.
Winter is a time of reflection, and during this time I have the thought that many artists have. It's not a nice one.
I think: "What am I DOING? My field is a bunch of fluffy nonsense! Why be an artist? Why be a performer?! I'm not helping others, and I'm not making a difference in the world."
Ouch.
It hurts to think such things.
I have compassion for this thought, but then I ask myself : "But doesn't art bring you such peace?"
And then I think of all of the times I've spent in total bliss on stage...
As Brutus in Julius Caesar at the Shakespeare's Globe Theater, proving to myself that my 5' 1", 110 lb body could fill a huge, outdoor Elizabethan theater and believably embody the character and spirit of a Roman warrior...
Closing "Spring Awakening," as Ilse, with "A Song of Purple Summer," seeing my whole cast rise around me and sing with their gorgeous voices...
And then I ask myself: "And hasn't your art brought peace to someone's life?"
And I think of the times when I've seen my work make a difference to someone...
Seeing the gratitude in an audience member's eyes as she tearfully told me about how my work in James Bosley's "Fun" made her feel so seen, as a survivor of childhood sexual abuse...
Being thanked by an Iraqi woman for taking the time to hear the story of her family's flight to the United States, and to perform it on stage in the Ivy Tech Storytelling Series...
Being engulfed in hugs from a whole classroom of kids from the Refugee Youth Summer Academy, in New York City, after having taught them Visual Arts and helped them with their English skills during the summer of 2015...
Thinking of all of these things, I once again say "Hell yeah!" to being an artist, and I also start to understand the value of the peace art can create. We all go through struggles in our lives. The world cycles through conflicts and regime changes, and upheavals - man-made or environmental.
In a world like this, peace, in whatever ways we can create it, is a necessity.
Artists bring peace in the form of laughter, in the form of a release of tears. Artists are constantly reminding us in their work that we are not alone. In their saddest and happiest tales, they whisper "Me Too."
On the stage, in the classroom, from the director's chair, I am so happy that I get to find peace, and to create it.
Artists create peace through creating Kinship. We create Kinship between performer and audience member, and between audience members. It is this bonding, this creation of kinship, that, as Father Greg Boyle of Homeboy Industries says in his book "Tattoos on the Heart," 'erases the margins of society..."
This year, when I sing that carol at the piano, with all my friend's surrounding me, I will remember that now, as we venture into 2018, is the perfect time for peace. Peace inside myself. Peace that I'll create for others.
I'll remind myself that peace is not selfish. It's something we all need to cultivate in order to do selfless work.
I'll remind myself that Art is not frivolous. That Art can create peace, through beauty, through kinship.
And I'll remember that Peace cultivated in each of us, even in a world that is not, at the moment, peaceful, may one day help us bring peace on earth.
Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas! Blessed Yule!
Aubrey