Soul of Nonviolence - Superficial Expression
“To me, any kind of killing, blaming of other people, punishing, or hurting other people is a very superficial expression of our anger. We want something much more powerful than that... this means getting out of our consciousness any kind of thinking that he, she, they, made me angry when they did that. When we think that way, I believe we’re very dangerous. ”
This week, Veronica invites us to explore a revolutionary idea based on a quote from Marshall Rosenberg—that anger can be strategically used to encourage us to go deeper. First we explore the danger of blaming other people. In that context, Veronica discusses how the most powerful thing we can do is to spend time getting to know what is happening within ourselves when we feel inclined to focus on the other. Cultivating awareness and non-reactivity takes practice to be able to move past the instinct to hit back at whatever has caused us discomfort or pain. Those skills are foundational to practicing nonviolence.
Veronica goes on to speak about how cultivating awareness can empower us to be part of the solution and not part of the problem. Gandhi said he used his anger to fuel his soul force. With meditation and training in nonviolence, we too can learn how to channel difficult feelings into something more productive and get out of a pattern of blame that holds us back.