Today is the
Vernal Equinox and International
Happiness Day. Last night was
the tenth anniversary of the Invasion of Iraq, and tonight is
Nowruz Eve –
and Dr. Riane Eisler speaks in Washington DC today!
I cannot let this confluence of events pass without comment, because the tenth anniversary of the Invasion of Iraq is slipping by
with barely a note of recognition, much less any soul searching. The President
made no direct remarks about it, but settled for a safe written
statement about honoring those “who made the ultimate sacrifice”. There was little discussion at all in the media, except
the usual cost/benefits analysis befitting corporate investors. At least, according
to the
New York Times, former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld found time to tweet: “10 yrs ago began the long, difficult work of liberating 25 mil
Iraqis. All who played a role in history deserve our respect &
appreciation.”
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All? Does that include the more than
150,000 civilians killed, and more than 350,000 wounded; the uncounted orphans; the three to five
million persons displaced directly as a result of the US led Invasion of Iraq –
what role did
they play in history? Did their lives not make the scales
tremble, even just a little, in the great gambit for war revenues and resources?
This afternoon in Washington DC, Dr. Eisler will have made the
case at a
congressional briefing that it makes economic sense
to fund early childhood education and care. How many briefings were held before
the decision was made to start a war? A decision that has already consumed over
eight hundred billion dollars (including eight billion “
outright wasted,” according
to the US
Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction). An Invasion that will end up
costing as much as
six trillion dollars during the next four decades, due to
the complex, life-long care that so many vets will require; that is, those who
don’t wind up homeless, or dead of suicide.
One
vet kills him or herself every sixty-five minutes – twenty-two American veterans kill themselves every day.
What does all this have to do with Happiness? Everything... it
has everything to do with happiness.... It has to do with the amazing
disconnect that allows us to create so much suffering with so much of our own
money, yes
, our own money; yet spend
so little to create true Happiness. From continent to continent, the cries for
help continue. How can we hear them all; how can we respond to them all?
By
doing what we are doing at the
Center for Partnership Studies, and the
Caring Economy Campaign, and through the
Spiritual Alliance to End Intimate Violence: because all of these assaults on the body of Mother Earth,
on other forms of Life; on our sons and daughters swept away by invasions; on the Mothers and Children of our Global
Community – all these different, seemingly endless assaults are linked by one thread – one
thought:
That Domination is an acceptable
way of Life.
It is Not. It Never has been. All the different habits of violence spring
like hydra heads from one throat – the belief that the Way of The Dominator is
the right way and the only way.
It is Not. By exposing that Great Lie and shaking off the delusion that the Dominator Way is
inevitable, we free ourselves from the Spell of Domestication (as the
Great Toltec
teachers put it). We no longer Agree to cooperate with the spreading of fear, the theft of resources, and colonization for cheap labor and resource removal. We seek out Ways in our
own Lives in which we ourselves are still contributing to Dominator cruelty and
destruction – through our investments, our purchasing choices, our actions or
lack of actions. We advocate the systematic transformation of our Dominator
cultures from within through Awareness, Choices, Alignment, Intent, Teaching –
and most of all through Love.
And that makes me Happy.
--And the biggest Holiday of all today: Malala went back to school!!
~~ Together We Walk the Partnership
Way
Toward Happy, Resilient Communities ~~
~ Happy International Happiness Day, Happy Spring Equinox,
Happy Nowruz/New Day! ~
