Breaking the War habit

It seems that War is inevitable, and the skies certainly reflect the difficult times. Astrologers and others are taking bets as to when the war will start… But let us back up a bit and examine why we have wars and how to prevent them.

There are, of course, many reasons to wage war. The same war can be explained many different ways, and more than one of them can be the right reason for the war, because the rationale depends upon the perspective from which you view the event.

So what about the late winter and spring of 2003? What is going on? It is not a surprise that the ongoing aspects, especially the long-lasting Pluto-Saturn opposition, bring out polarities and marked fervor over religion and cultural heritage. Here are some of the reasons war is likely now. Individually we are not so highly evolved that we can resolve strongly differing views without violence. The bulk of humans are not able to disagree and stand back from conflict. We are enjoying being righteous and joining sides for and against the war, which is guaranteed to perpetuate the situation. The media have drummed up support for war. Our habits have made us too dependent upon petroleum and created a situation that causes conflict with Iraq as well as the other petroleum producing states. Because of our dependence upon oil, we have ignored and overlooked our responsibilities for improving the lives of people around the world. We have instead allowed tyrants unencumbered rights to enslave their own people through perpetuating their ignorance, crippling economies that should have allowed better conditions, and allowing rulers to use violence against their people. 

How can we break this cycle? The answer calls for individual work and for cultural and social change in all the countries of the world. The answer is one that is difficult to enact and one that may not happen this time. But we can start to become smart about war and how to prevent it, right?

Let’s start with the easy steps to preventing war: individual actions. You can, and need to work on your spiritual development, as your input is part of the whole. When you have peace in your heart, you contribute peace to others. How do you get to that radiance of being? Step by step, following a system of spiritual development that includes meditation and most likely prayer and spiritual counseling or psychotherapy. But there are other, more practical steps you also can take to make war less likely. First, strange as it may seem, your physical health is also important, since your healthy physical body allows your spirit to develop and also allows you to fully contribute in society. So begin my being physically healthy. You know what you need to do, proceed to do it.

Other personal decisions you can make include making less use of oil. If you drive, use an economical, high miles per gallon, car and arrange your life so that you don’t do all that much driving. Perhaps you could walk to work, or use public transportation? Perhaps when it is time to locate a new residence, you relocate closer to your job instead of farther away.

You also can contribute to a peaceful world by being non-committal when others try to engage you in a strong pro-war or anti-war position. Both of the extremes are polarizing and serve to perpetuate conflict.

Socially, people in the developed countries have many options as well. We can encourage public conversation about Iraq. We can speak about the value of human life in the entire world. We can encourage an exploration of what is good about the Arabs and their culture, rather than holding on to the idea that most are terrorists. We can work to have a strong economy in each country, as prosperous and satisfied people usually aren’t looking for fights. We can work to reduce our dependence on (relatively scarce) raw materials, such as petroleum, which have to be obtained from other countries. We can support more trade around the world, not less, and encourage the free flow of information about the social, political and economic rights of citizens in the industrialized west. We can strongly support secular education systems worldwide, in the hope that separating education from religion will lessen conflict. Finally the rich countries of the world can be more generous with their wealth and knowledge, so that all benefit. Truly, we are all in this together, and together we can find a way to break the war habit.