PEACE IN OUR LIFETIME:
CHAPTER SUMMARIES

Chapter by chapter, here is a more detailed look at Peace in Our Lifetime.

Introduction: Assuming Our Power As Peacemakers

Anger and hate are ravishing far too many areas of the world, and even when we’re not physically in the crossfires, we’re still poisoned by them. Like people living downwind of nuclear test sites in the 1950s and 1960s, each of us is bombarded by the fallout of conflict.

The introduction suggests that this is our turning point, our opportunity to create the peaceful culture we seek, beginning with our own inner peace and extending it outward. If just one of us raises the cooperation and light right where we are, the tension in our culture is eased dramatically.

Peace is practical, teachable--and more powerful than we’ve been led to believe--as soon as peace is expressed from our own hearts and beings.

Chapter 1: Believing In Peace

Each of us has a daily choice: to escalate the violence in the world with our own actions or to create greater peace. We can dramatically change the tone, civility, and comfort of our homes, workplaces, and communities when we set the intention to stay calm, speak thoughtfully, brainstorm solutions, and invest in the overall peace in our families, offices and towns. This excerpt features the fascinating story of a Jewish woman in the Middle East who chose to hold the peace when she inadvertently dialed and connected with an Arab man. Her intention to be a force for peace has affected tens of thousands of people. She shows how we can be the same force for kindness and understanding right where we are.

Chapter 2: Working It Out

We often loathe and avoid conflict at all costs. But conflict is inevitable, and it serves a necessary purpose. It creates tension, which forces us to get clear on our values and choices and allows us to grow and come together as people. How we can become comfortable with conflict, master it, and even become powerful mediators is explored in this excerpt. It shows how we can be more assertive, speak our peace, and channel our energy into creative problem solving to transform the root of the conflict--and get our needs met at the same time.

Chapter 3: Ending Our Demonizing

Demonizing others is one of the biggest roadblocks to peace. We each have our own demons -- the “Others” -- whom we mistrust, even hate for how they’ve persecuted us. We, on the other hand, are the moral, wounded, preyed upon, blameless victims.

This chapter explains how to recognize our patterns of demonizing, get to the root of why we do it, and examine the distortions and inaccuracies of our perceptions. It helps us heal our own demons and accept that, as part of being human, we all have our own shadows and light, beauty and ugliness. Through this acceptance, we can stop demonizing others and feel greater connectedness, even tenderness, to those we once hated.

Chapter 4: Channeling Anger And Fear

Unleashing our anger through intimidation, bullying, and pre-emptive strikes is rocking our world. Every time we use violence, it rebounds and bites us back more harshly. This chapter explores some of the root of our anger mentality and what do to about it. It shows that anger is often fear wrapped in a different package. We fear we won’t get our needs met, or we will lose control, or that something precious will be lost.

Through rich stories from Martin Luther King, Jr. Arun Gandhi, and others, this chapter shows how anger can be a powerful signal that we need to make some changes, often radical ones, to go to a higher level in our lives. These and other peacemakers show how anger can be harnessed as a power and passion to bring about greater stability and peace for ourselves and those around us.

Chapter 5: Grieving Our Losses

Too many times, we stay locked in conflict and anger because our hearts are broken. This chapter illustrates that grieving well finally releases emotional pain that festers inside and leads us to do battle. It shows how we can transform our grief and sadness so our suffering is used not to keep us separate and suspicious of others, but to bring us together. Grieving well can connect us to our shared humanity, our fierce inner power, and make us feel deep kinship with others who suffer, as well.

Chapter 6: Listening For Peace

“Violence is the language of the unheard,” Martin Luther King, Jr. said. The laying on of ears can calm even the most violent confrontations. When we are listened to deeply, we can remove even the most explosive bombs from our hearts. Blame, anger, resentment, revenge, can all be healed. This chapter shows how we can learn the art of compassionate listening, and how it is being used to form new bridges between people all over world. Featured is an amazing organization that trains people in compassionate listening all over the world.

Chapter 7: Deploying Our Hearts

Too often we gain power from coercion and force, not compassion and love. This chapter explores why the force of compassion is the most potent tool in peacemaking. When we are able to connect with our own innate goodness and heart, that connection is a stabilizing force and a balm in the most hostile situations. By connecting to our own humanity, we are offered a release from our hostility. This chapter shows that “love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend,” as Mahatma Gandhi said.

Chapter 8: Forgiving The Unforgiveable

Forgiveness may be the toughest peace challenge of all. Even when we tell ourselves it’s the right thing to do, we still can’t give up the ghosts of our resentments. This section shows how we can finally forgive, let go, and free ourselves to be our best and highest selves. It illustrates powerful ways to detach, emotionally and energetically, from the negative experiences and memories that haunt us. It shows how we can release past traumas from our thoughts and finally free ourselves from unhealed pain.

Conclusion: Building Beloved Communities

This chapter celebrates how communities everywhere are using the peacemaking skills to come together, form vibrant communities, and spread peace throughout the world. It shows that everywhere, even in the most war-devastated areas of the earth, like flowers breaking from parched ground, peaceful communities are emerging where violence once dominated.