Meditators Assemble from Diverse Backgrounds

author : Daisy Ouye topic : Community Meditation for Global Peace

by Daisy Ouye

Once each year, on the first weekend in August, a World Peace flag waves a full 24 hours in front of the Capital building. The Community Meditation for Global Peace, sponsored by Interfaith Works draws a diverse crowd around Tivoli Fountain. In part, because it is a nonsecular/nonpolitical event.

”It’s a wonderful way to connect with everyone who wants peace,” a fellow member of Olympia Women In Black told me. The guest book tallied about 75 visitors this year, and just as many wishes of gratitude.

In its fourth year, this event appeals to me because it brings people with different religious, spiritual, political and ideological backgrounds together. We are so often, and sometimes quite systematically, divided along these lines. This event reminds me that we can choose not to separate.

The Community Meditation for Global Peace has been an annual tradition for many of us who gain strength and a feeling that we can be more effective because we are all related.

Jeanette Larsen, a participant at the event, calls meditation an opportunity to “transcend ourselves. Thoughts become more global and we become more able to act within our sphere of influence.”