We’re better than to let that continue.
The Woodbridge Trees and Monument for Peace
Founded and dedicated knowing that more must be done for peace
that much can be done for peace in communities everywhere
and that peace can be made stronger
by people acting together
in simple ways
known to build peace
Building stronger peace for a better world
A brief introduction
The prosperity and joy brought by peace rest on its scale and its continuity. The more widely peace is shared:
- the more are the opportunities for prosperity and joy,
- and the lower is the likelihood of disruption.
Peace research identifies other vital conditions: inclusivity, sharing, co-operation and tolerance to calm and for the deflection of violence in all of its overt and covert forms.
Another helpful line of thought sees peace as a condition that we can feel as clothing us in layers or zones of comfort. A deeply personal ‘inner peace’ is wrapped in a larger zone of ‘personal peace’. Further covering layers merit the names ‘familial peace’ and ‘communal peace’, embracing those in your family and wider community.
But, how many other ways are there of thinking about peace? And which of them can help us to make peace stronger?
What is peace?
Around the world people see and talk about peace in different ways such as an:
activity, deity, event, feeling, ideal or place, social or spiritual condition, and more
More geographically peace an be seen as a condition that’s:
global, international, national, regional, communal, familial, personal or inner
Websites about peace reflect a similar diversity.
This website is about peace each of us can do something about . .
so not a place, event or ideal, nor a global or international condition
just a natural peace that we can grow during a lifetime to embrace all
What peace can we strengthen, actually?
Most directly we can strengthen our inner, personal, familial (family) and communal peace by our actions. We normally do that from birth. How we do that among ourselves is described in a fuller version of this introduction, and in a Post [Here] about the origin and growth of peace.
Indirectly, by learning more about peacewe inoculate ourselves and our personal peace against some of the effects of strife in places beyond our reach. It’s not unusual to be disturbed by international news of violence or armed conflict. It’s helpful though, and least damaging, to be an informed critic of events rather than a powerless observer.
What can we actually do to strengthen peace?
Action and Learning
Dozens of things we can do and things we can learn are outlined in these pages and will be detailed in Posts.
The range and character of those things are illustrated by:
- Identify a favourite tree near you and think of it as your own symbolic Tree for Peace
- Make more use of your natural peace making skills
- Add your chosen tree here to help create a Virtual Forest for Peace
- Communicate relevant constructive thoughts, ideas, information or questions to this website
- Make a Peace calendar. Put 2 or 3 events among other dates in your planner. Find out more.
- Get and wear a Peace Tartan scarf – meet and greet others wearing the same.
- Find out what Johan Galtung thought to be a ‘conflict triangle’
- Or consider the starting point suggested at the end of this Introduction
Each of them can be a Gift to peace in a very real sense.
- each will add strength to your inner and personal peace
- if done with a friend each will add also to their personal peace
- if what you do becomes visible to others each will enlarge communal peace
Learning for Peace
There is a lot to know about peace, including about how peace can be made stronger.
There’s Early and Junior learning about, for example, the many different ways people think of peace and the making and building of a ‘communal peace’ in schools. There’s Higher learning that’s created and continues to grow a robust framework of ideas, concepts and theories tested in practical peace-enhancing field-work in some of the world’s most violence afflicted.
There’s a regrettable gap between that Junior and that Higher learning.
It’s an ambition of this Monument to plug that gap;
- to bring ‘general knowledge’ more in line with a modern understanding of peace and
- to enable peace education for the young who have the longest to gain from it
For those reasons these pages will assemble and share Learning for peace for all age-groups.
A starter Action for peace
A simple starting point
A simple starting point would be with the natural skills for peace that we all have.
Making peace stronger might be as simple as using some of them more often or rediscovering and sharpening a few that have not been much used.
Which of these are your peace building strong points?
advocacy calmness communication compassion
consultation co-operation doing bits of good empathy
forbearance forgiveness generosity humility
kindness mediation negotiation patience
persistence sensitivity tolerance vigilance
and, about peace, your:
knowledge thinking talking understanding
capacities – and more as well, each offer ways for each of us to make a stronger peace by:
- taking stock of those personal capacities
- planning to do or use them more often, and
- getting better at doing those we don’t use
For a way to take stock and the take this Action for peace see the Posts
[Here] for ‘Taking stock of our capacities for peace’ or
[Here] for ‘Little bits of good’
A fuller version of this Introduction is contained in a Post [Here] ‘Introduction’.
Another starter Action for peace
Your thoughts as a reader
Making peace stronger requires most of the above as well as what is already being done by major organisations such as the United Nations.
Among vital contributor are communication, co-operation and sharing
So if constructive thoughts, questions, ideas or relevant information have come to your mind in reading this please message this site if you wish by email to:
Use the same email to nominate a tree for the Virtual Forest for Peace, with a low-resolution photo and location by nearest Postcode, Zipcode, or name of town or country.
Peace development