OUR MISSION

PROMOTING PEACE THROUGH MEDITATION, EDUCATION AND SERVICE

The dictionary defines the word peace in two ways. One definition writes that peace is the “freedom from disturbance” or “tranquility.” This definition is a personal experience which is synonymous with calm, quietude, silence, stillness, and solitude. The second definition is “a state or period in which there is no war or a war has ended.” This definition is a corporate experience which can encompass an entire country and is synonymous with law and order, harmony, amity, goodwill, friendship, and nonviolence.

The psychologist, Rick Hanson, writes about the personal experience of peace. He comments that when a person experiences peace they are engaged with life while feeling calm, relaxed and safe. Moments of peace brighten a person’s outlook and often more life opportunities are seen. Generally, one experiences a greater degree of harmony with self and others. Hanson states that there are 4 types of peace. They are the following:

The Peace of Ease involves moments of relaxation and relief which activate the parasympathetic nervous system. When it is activated it produces a calm and relaxed feeling in the mind and the body. It also lifts mood, strengthens the immune system and reduces blood pressure.

The Peace of Tranquility is a deep quiet when the mind and body are settled and there is no sense of deficit or disturbance. This is when an inner freedom is experienced as there is no grasping or clinging, simply acceptance of what is.

The two other types of peace described by Hanson are more subtle.

The Peace of Awareness is the place inside the mind that witnesses whatever arises: be it something desirable or undesirable. This awareness is an open space in which sights and sounds, thoughts and feelings, arise and then disappear. The space itself is never ruffled or harmed by what passes through it. This is the level that is below thought where the stream of consciousness flows. This part of the mind is always at peace.

The Peace of What’s Unchanging is for those who have had a mystical experience and have witnessed an Infinite Presence that is inextricably bound to the very fabric of existence in which all life is eternally interconnected.

Each of these four types of peace are advanced by the Center for the Promotion of Peace (CPOP). This is done by teaching meditation and inviting the community to practice meditating daily in our zendo. It is done by educating the public through articles that draw awareness about the need for peace and ways that a peaceful existence can be the building blocks to a constructive and satisfying worldview. This new worldview then dramatically influences “clear action” which CPOP promotes through selfless service projects that reinforce this new sense of a peaceful self addressing the needs of the world be they local or global.

We believe that as the individual incorporates a more well rounded peaceful existence into everyday life, it has a way of making a small but still meaningful impact on one’s community, country and even places that go beyond the boundaries of one’s life. Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn has written about the connection between personal and world peace this way: “Being whole and simultaneously part of a larger whole, we can change the world simply by changing ourselves. If I become a center of love and kindness in this moment, then in a perhaps small but hardly insignificant way, the world now has a nucleus of love and kindness it lacked the moment before.”