What's the opposite of speaking the answer is waiting to speak one thing you can do is remind ourselves that our 1st urge to get angry or to be really fearful is probably coming from the Amidala and we need to give the rest of our brain time to catch up fear is a projection of something that may or may not happen and when you see that if you can see or simply projecting something into the future you don't have to believe it because one of the hardest things for people to give up in the using nonviolent communication is the objective of women getting what you want stay tuned for top peacemaking communication themes today on Peace Talks Radio. This is Peace Talks Radio series on peacemaking in nonviolent conflict resolution on series producer Paul Ingles with a special program today as we talk with people who've been working out nonviolent conflict resolution strategies in all kinds of different scenarios throughout our series we've learned that certain themes about effective communication skills seem to come up again and again so we thought we'd hear some of our guests talk about these things maybe you'll be able to walk away with a tip or 2 that you can put to use in your daily life at your workplace with your spouses kids relatives strangers sales clerks friends enemies. Rivals and even with Mother Nature herself. Here's a list of the top peacemaking communication themes in our peace talks radio interviews all run him down and then we'll delve into the more slowly as we go number one practice deep listening Number 2 know something about how your brain works. Number 3 Engage your own fears number 4 challenge your own thoughts. Number 5 empathize with the other and number 6 establish a quality of connection it's more important than getting what you want let's start with this concept of practicing deep and active listening and this is Aaron Wolfe co-author of a book called managing and transforming water conflicts telling us what he learned from Buddhist monks the value of deep focused listening in any circumstance we find ourselves in the most profound thing is how to be really present in a room people who've talked to Buddhist monks or or people with deep meditative training when you talk to somebody like that you really feel their presence they listen he listened in a way that I can't remember being listened to before you really feel like you're absolutely at the center of the universe and that practice of deep presence of deep transformative listening I think was the most important skill that I learned 1st from him and then from from others I think those are those are the kinds of skills that that the spiritual community offers How do you silence and in a productive and useful way we're not trained in that very well we're in the rest of the world they joke about Americans that the joke is to an American what's the opposite of speaking and the answer is waiting to speak. And you notice when you listen to when you when you watch people in conversation that's what they're doing their whole body language their whole energy is waiting to jump into the into the conversation but we also learn from spiritual traditions around the world this understanding that kind of anger and force is generally a shield for vulnerability and you can't get to the vulnerability until you offer the silence in the space and the listening to allow the anger to spend itself to dissipate and it's only been able to share the vulnerability where you can have a much more productive dialogue as water conflicts mediator Aaron Wolf in my opinion most conflicts stems from one side or the other or both feeling like they're not heard not understood so the mere intention of listening better of reflecting what we just heard back to the one we're listening to could do so much to help us prevent and solve conflicts and I'm going to throw in a personal pet peeve here deep listening does involve that step of her flexing back what you've understood that you just heard it's the chance for the speaker to correct you if you get it wrong and folks as soon as someone tells us how they're feeling let's all try to resist the temptation to say oh yeah the same thing happened to me let me tell you all that that that's not listening that's more like waiting to speak to jump in and tell our own story you know in the t.v. Series Seinfeld This was demonstrated fairly often with the one who was speaking 1st rightly stopping the other and saying I thought we were talking about me. Another example of someone who made deep listening to part of his piece work was Ralph Bunche a scholar of world affairs and race relations bunch was recruited from academia 1st into the Us State Department and then into the fledgling United Nations he stuck boldly on to the world stage as a peace to go shooter and advocate for the liberation of peoples of color from Plone will rule ultimately he was heralded as a role model for all in human relations here his biographer Brian Urquhart talks about the listening skills of his friend and colleague he was an incredibly good listener. In fact I think it was. With time and often coming general in the Israeli army who once described joining the onus of agreements he said. Bunch would sit. Just looking at the person who was speaking absent on moving and you could somehow see. This this knowledge being received into some central area. And being thought is filed actually for that I later on and it was a very very good. One of my thought a vision of Ralph who was I think the person I spent more than mine tile life than anybody else. Of him hunched over a legal sized patch with a whole supply of pencil writing in longhand the whole number of things mostly a form of us to try to get run problems that come up during the day and he was he was a great perfectionist as I said he was an academic and. Genius was to be able to listen all day to all 3 order it was sized to a conflict. And then 2 in the night to write up a form of was which they could all accept which would mean you could move forward for big great classic example of this was the honest disagreements between Israel and 5 Arab neighbors which he trusted and got agreed on in 49 he could. Chew it in his own mind the problems and the fear. And the difficulty is of the people he was dealing with not least the kind of reception where they're going to get when they went back home if given the way too much he could get all that working with the objections they had made to some previous proposal and you could reformulate that proposal in a way that would give everybody just enough leeway to get through something that very few people can do and that to do it you have to have 1st of all other nor mostly acute analytical minds and secondly a very great capacity for understanding the difficulties of other people what you're talking about is a capacity for empathy as well absolutely I mean somebody once said that. One of the generals. Ploys in some way I think in the Middle East once or that Ralph had the kind of size that he'd ever seen and I think it was true he was a he was a person who really had a lot of usual appreciation and liking for his fellow human beings. And various and often not necessarily have been a common. Form of quantity he really had but the whole idea all helping people in trouble those are the people he was interested in he was surprising and interested in very important people that never did that kind of the written mind about the middle but he was deeply interested in the lives of ordinary people and how you could improve them surprise her quat talking about Ralph Bunche Ok Number 2 on our list of top peacemaking communication themes in peace talks radio interviews is know how your brain works let's learn a little more about how our brain works from a conversation we had with Daniel Goleman who wrote the books emotional intelligence and social intelligence Well you know our brain is wired for a different reality than we live in today the brain the human brain was shaped over about 80000 generations in evolution when we mostly lived on Savannah's and we were dealing with real life urgent dire threats darling Tigers dangerous Russel's in the in the woods that mourned us something was happening and so we're a tuned to a range of dangers that we don't face instead we face symbolic dangerous this is one of the complications. And that symbolic danger is for example of somebody steps in front of you in the line at the post office it's like you're being attacked but really nothing's wrong. Well that's exactly right I mean that the danger or the threat can be something like someone else took credit for my work or you know honey we have to talk or any of those kinds of messages that we get that we might take it as a potential threat but in fact biologically were no threat at all and yet we respond with the same served of stress hormones and shifts of blood to our limbs so we can run and fight so we respond with kind of an over kill to threats in today's life and what can people do what can our listeners do to mediate that overkill that you talk about when we're more reactive and we really need to be well one thing you. Or any of us can do is remind ourselves that our 1st urge to get angry or to be really fearful is probably coming from the middle and we need to give the rest of our brain time to catch up so just taking a pause and kind of a mindful pause. Before we respond is essential I remember going to a classroom in New Haven Connecticut on the wall of every room there's a poster it's a stoplight red light yellow like green light and says when you when you're getting upset remember the stop light red light stop calm down and think before you act that's the critical piece to realize that our emotions come to us unbidden we we don't expect them we don't ask for them they come from an unconscious part of the brain but once we feel a certain way we have a choice point which is how we respond yellow light Think of our brains are different things you could do a green light pick the best one and try it out well you know kids at the schools are taught to use it from kindergarten on I think it's good advice for any of us so in short I think with Daniel Goleman strong to say there is slow it down know that your brain will try to pull you into some sort of false threat alert way more often than is necessary and that you have the power to divert the reactive energy to a smarter part of your brain. More about slowing it down now and knowing how your brain and nervous system work from Rick Hanson author of Buddha's brain and other books when we get activated in other words we get excited or aroused or rushed I mean much of modern life is about rushing about as soon as we're rushing about we're getting activation of a sympathetic wing of the autonomic nervous system it's the fight or flight stress response wing and it has its wholesome purposes but as soon as you start activating that wing you start warming up the circuits of fighting or fleeing in other words you start activating a system that is primed to go negative so suddenly it's on a yellow flag condition yes you can do a lot of good things under yellow flag but it's really helpful to appreciate the fact that you're under a yellow flag that means that if we're stressed or revved up or preoccupied or rushing about we're much more likely to be herbal we're much more likely to take offense we're much more likely to feel threatened when something was actually really trivial we're much more likely to take things personally because rushing about activates the sense of self you know me myself and I and with the world you know kind of outnumbered be a leader but I got to get these e-mails done now right now as soon as we go into that mode it's a lot more difficult to stay present to be relaxed to be connected to see clearly what's happening with the other person and so forth so one thing I've really come to to do out of all this is I kind of feel I've got a little needle I've got an internal stress meter and I was watching that needle a fair amount of the time I'm not perfect by any means but I'm just kind of tracking it and when I start getting revved up I'll deliberately take some long accelerations or do other kinds of things that act to activate the person pathetic wing of the nervous system and calm that sympathetic fight flight response down and part of that slow down effort that Rick Hanson there and Daniel Goleman before we're talking about is a subset of knowing how to dance with your fear sensations a wonderful meditation teacher Eric Holder it was our very 1st guest in 2002. Gauging the anxiety when I get anxiety boy I'm sweating now my heart is pounding right how do I engage that well you know that said Franklin Roosevelt when he 1st became president his very 1st words to this country are the ones that are most memorable We have nothing to fear but fear itself this was in the middle of the Great Depression a lot of people were suffering in order to get past fear to work our way through fear we have to engage it directly to see what it is. Fear is always about something in the future it's never about something that's happening in the moment the future doesn't exist fear is a projection of something that may or may not happen and when you see that if you can see you're simply projecting something into the future you don't have to believe it. You can say I don't need to believe this and to come back to whatever your present situation of matter how challenging it is by reducing the fear your present situation is much more workable just one little example as years ago I was doing some deep therapeutic work and I was working with some severe trauma that I had as a child and as a result of doing that work terror actually came up and not just in the therapeutic situation so I was driving to work one day and I was experiencing terror. My hair was standing straight up you know that there were these waves of energy going through my body very intense experience my mind happened to be strong at that moment. And and so I knew it was just fear and I was able to hold it so as I just held fear there and just kept driving I got to work and a coworker greeted me and said How are you doing and I said well I'm experiencing terror right now but otherwise I'm fine. And it was true in that moment I didn't have to believe the terror and so it was possible to feel all the physiological reactions and all of the contraction in the mind and say Ok this is just fear so fear is a stressful thought and Eric Holder there suggests that we don't have to believe it author Byron Katie originator of a technique called The work takes us even further down that path into number 4 on our list challenging your own thoughts when we have a stressful thought just ask the question is a true is it true 100 percent of the time really is a true Here's more from Byron Katie the work is a way to identify and question the thoughts the cause of all the suffering in the world everyone is suffering and anyone can do it if they're open to it so let's say for example I believed he doesn't care about me. The 1st question is it's a true so I'm beginning to question the thought He doesn't care about me the 2nd question can I absolutely know that it's true he doesn't care about me and then notice how the mind begins to flood me with proof and images you know to convince me that it's true and just to notice and wait and allow another answer to surface. In that 3rd question how do you react when you believe that thought and the 4th question Who would you be without that thought and then I invite people to turn it around to the opposite he doesn't care about me the opposite would be I don't care about me and that's a mind blower you know it's like how can you know how can I expect people to care about me if I don't even care about me and then I find a way that I don't care about me and it wakes me up to them and I'm shocked and then another opposite or turn around would be I don't care about him and I began to identify where that's true and then immediately I'm away to it and my behavior changes and it's nothing I have to do so my behavior with that person and everyone it radically shifts because we're working with original cause and mind is original cause mind is cause Byron Katie's husband and co-author Stephen Mitchell reading an excerpt from a book a 1000 names for joy at the Santa Fe public about it February 2007 sadness is always a sign that you're believing a stressful thought that isn't true for you it's a constriction and it feels bad conventional wisdom says differently but the truth is that sadness isn't rational it isn't a natural response and it can't ever help you it just indicates the loss of reality the loss of the awareness of love sadness is the war with what is it's a tantrum when the mind is clear there isn't any sadness there can be so there from Byron Katie's book just an example of challenging even the idea of sadness. I don't think they're saying deny sadness but realize that it's something our mind manufactures and we can set it aside and begin to recognize that there's more than sadness or around us even in the darkest times there is love somewhere probably fairly nearby I'm Paul Ingles I'm running down top peacemaking communication themes in our peace talks radio interviews over the years more in a moment. That by. Live. In the or are. The one. That you're. You're listening to Peace Talks Radio on line with all the episodes in our series on peacemaking and nonviolent conflict resolution at Peace Talks Radio dot com and we're sampling a number of them today as we summarize what seemed to be common peacemaking communication techniques that many of our guests of talked about another theme we hear again and again in our various conflict resolution strategies conversations is empathize with the other whether a friend you have a little disagreement with or your so-called enemy who might display behavior and opinions completely opposite of what you would do say or feel and in fact a former soldier clarified what this really means when framing your discourse it's former Army captain and author Paul Chappelle so the thing about waging peace is that you respect them as a human being and you recognize that in this struggle you are opponent is ignorance your opponent is hatred your opponent is greed your opponent is misunderstanding and you want to attack their hatred and defeat it you want to attack their ignorance you want to attack their misunderstanding if you hate them that or if you demonize them you actually magnify their hatred because if you look at Martin Luther King Jr. He was getting dozens of death threats a day his house was bombed he was arrested multiple times he was eventually killed but you never saw him talk about the people who were pressing him in this demonizing dehumanizing way that you see liberals talk about conservatives and vice versa and he had much more right to demonize his opponent or look at Nelson Mandela Nelson Mandela was in jail for 27 years and he was actually able to win the hearts and minds of some of his prison guards through having a respectful attitude toward them former Army captain and author Paul Chappelle I had a chance to talk to radio documentary producer Joe Richmond once about Nelson Mandela Richmond had met him and produced a multi-part series on him called Mandela An Audio History and he felt that Mandela did an extraordinary job empathizing with the so-called enemy when he was released from prison and then sat down with the whites to negotiate a new South African government you know I think there's the moment when. The a and c. Sits down with the National Party and Pik Botha who was one of the one of the ministers that actual part of the white ruling party talks about that when they sat down that night and Elam made this give this whole history of the offer Connor people and that's how we started you know basically saying I understand your history I understand your issues I understand where you're coming from and I think and that obviously made a huge impact on him. You know it because as he says you know here I am about to sit down at the negotiating table with someone I've spent 2 decades thinking of as a terrorist and he's studied me he studied you know my own grievances and my own history I think there's just something incredibly powerful about understanding your enemy both as maybe tactically and strategically but much more than that understanding the other side because nothing is ever simple in black and white and you see the cracks in everyone's story and everyone's kind of history and so I think that you know trying to understand the other side that's what it Mindell and made a point of doing that and I think it's something that it's a lesson that I that I kind of take away from this whole history is that no one's ever so simple and you know every time you go into you know you have these preconceived notions about the way someone is or the way some history is you dig a little more and you realize you were you're not right you know there's always something a little more complicated there Joe Richman produced the series of Mandela An Audio History and to elaborate on Paul Chappelle's earlier point about Martin Luther King Jr King was a great student of history and used it to overcome the segregationists during the drive for civil rights you know we're used to hearing military speak that you need to know your enemy to defeat them well in peacemaking speak you have to know how people who exhibit prejudice the King's case came to their belief system if you want to have any hope of making your case in the discourse and that you have to share that knowledge about the opponent's case with the people you hope to recruit for your nonviolent cause for change. The late scholar and friend of Martin Luther King Jr And one of his speech writers Vincent Harding was a guest on our program in 2014 and I asked him about how King promoted that empathy for the other in his speeches and Dr Harding as we see in several of Dr King's speeches Dr King felt it really important to give detailed historical content in fact it seemed that he knew it might seem to proper Sorel for his audience at times because he pleads in this one that stay with me on this it's important to understand the roots of Southern white racism and he describes how poor whites learned to resent blacks in the years after the Civil War It's as if he didn't want to make it too simple talk about why and how he does this and these remarks and you know it seems like it's a pattern that he included in many of his remarks he wasn't afraid to go into the history in fact he felt it strengthened his statements and I gather poor Well a couple of things to reflect on the one where every you see him addressing a community of people whether in his ever needs a church in Atlanta or before that. And when Gummi Martin came. Consciously it was always trying. To be not that didactic teacher but the come passion that teacher but he felt he had to teach he understood that there were many things about the very history of this country and the State of the world that needed to be taught and where ever you look at is materials. You see that he was teaching trying to bring people to new possibilities of knowledge and understanding because he understood that we can never move towards the kind of country that we might be if we are ignorant of how we got to where we are now and that's like everything else in life he was very much aware of the need to call our attention to the missteps misunderstandings that led us into the trap of a segregated society and so he thought that it would not be a good thing to try to talk about a new future. Without constantly reminding people how did we get here. And that kind of wisdom understanding. Is still needed in American society we are still on many levels very ignorant of our own history as a country and not much of it is being taught in our schools King was a teacher and even though he recognizes as you say at times that teaching can get a little wary some for people he knew that it was also necessary and that is a part of almost all of his oratory sermons whatever it might be the teaching as specially teachings about the past and teachings about the possibilities for the future. Before moving ahead in our list of peaceful communication tips I want to offer you some encouragement a proper bring some of this into your own life see lest you think that it takes years of deep thinking to get to these realizations about the basics of peaceful communication and self awareness Well just listen to these wise folks well like take my Luther King for an example he was trying to make wealth peace for the African Americans and he he was saying to them you know don't fight about it you know the white men are your brothers so we shouldn't fight each other we should just tell ourselves that we are African American and we have rights 282010 Youth Voices episode of our series included conversations with youngsters at a Universalist Church in Albuquerque about how to make peace I could make more friends that would probably work how would you do that. 1st you say hi just pretty easy step 2 they answer a lot of my answer that's Step 2 basically. Try to get to know all of course you had to get try to get to know them find out where from the world or from . To. Find out what language they speak I think so they can kill every day would be I guess living like oh it's going to die in 5 seconds or less die tomorrow and just living every day as best as he can and not. Least being here and he had something silly like so many to get can so and you're angry because that was your pencil and you got it fixed if you were to not be able to see that person ever again the last thing he said to that Christmas and never talking to you again a something really hurtful you know going to a credit when later the night your friend in you might because you were mean to them over a pencil you know those kids from the peacemaking class were amazing a lot of times I think we have all the answers as kids and then I'm learning them or have them chased away from us by other influences and as we've heard from more than one guest no one is born violent So let's start to wrap up our special communication things with a communication technique that I think brings together a lot of these streams in search of a stablish in a trustworthy quality of connection between all of us and has nothing to do with getting what we want. The man who literally wrote the book on this and set it up in a way that we can remember is Marshall Rosenberg so nonviolent communication says let's learn how to be honest about how we are 1st of all the tell people specifically what they're doing that is or is not contributing to our well being and to be very specific about that not to mix in any diagnosis or any analysis and I call that a clear observation observation step right and then once we've done that we're honest with people but we're honest with them from the heart like telling them what's alive in us when they do that and that more specifically is how we feel what emotions we feel and we connect our feelings to our needs and then we follow that up with the other question what would make life more wonderful and we answer that with a very clear request now using any fuzzy language but exactly what would we like back from that person at this moment in response to what we have said in response to the fact that some of our needs are not getting met by their behavior we're happy to have actors Linda road back and Scott sure row here with us today who are occasionally going to give voice to some of these concepts and role play some with Marshall Linda's going to give us a brief before and after demonstration of n.b.c. To get us started here this is right from Marshall's book so Here's the before scene Linda as a frustrated mom of a teenager. Thomas I've told you a 1000000 times to keep this living room clean you make me crazy pick up all these socks now or you're not getting to use the car tonight Ok So Marshall let's start with the before shot here I'm guessing that this approach sounds pretty familiar to listeners who would say some of them that well there's a firm threat of punishment there it may accomplish the goal of getting socks picked up what's wrong with the picture though well what's wrong with the picture is that it looks like the mother has single mindedness a purpose to get the son to do what she wants and whenever we have single mindedness a purpose it's our objective to get what we want it leaves the other person with the impression that lets a lie than them doesn't matter and when people believe that they don't enjoy doing what we're asking them to do even if it's something they would generally enjoy doing and so they're more likely then to resist doing it or do it with an energy will pay for Ok so for Marshall's book now another option same scenario Frustrated Mom with a teenager this time using n.b.c. Thomas when I see 2 balls of dirty socks under the coffee table and another 3 next to the t.v. Well I feel irritated because I'm needing more order in the rooms that we share in common would you be willing to put your socks in your room or in a washing machine so out of the components work here to make this more effective in your view she did say what she observed she said her feeling and needs and made it clear requests use the mechanics perfectly that many people use the mechanics hoping that it will be a way of getting what they want. Because one of the hardest things for people to give up in using nonviolent communication is the objective of winning getting what you want. Now when I say that many people think then I'm suggesting you be a chump and just give up your needs and given no not at all the objective is to create the quality of connection that will get everybody's needs met but that means we cannot be addicted to getting our request fulfilled by the other person means we're more interested in the quality of connection. Than in any specific result. Nonviolent Communication founder Marshall Rosenberg So again the top peacemaking communication themes in our peace talks radio interviews over the years practice deep listening number 2 Know little bit about how your brain works Number 3 Engage your own fears number 4 challenge your own thoughts number 5 empathize with the other and number 6 establish a quality of connection and know what's more important than getting what you want so you might think well all this is well and good but can even just us listening to this program today make a difference trying to apply these peacemaking communication skills well think of it this way as start the cotton who used to work with Martin Luther King Jr told us in an interview if you pour water on a fire and it doesn't entirely put it out does that mean that water doesn't put out a fire no what does it mean it just means we need more water so if you being a good listener speaking honestly and calmly practicing empathy being kind and acting compassionately doesn't bring peace everywhere does that mean those things don't work to make peace. No it just means we need more people doing those things a short break now and then we'll be back with more about peaceful communication techniques as well as one of our favorite all time stories that brought together many of these techniques and one compelling example and we'll also hear from some Peace Talks Radio listeners all ahead stay with us. Move. Forward. That war or what you're. More or. I'm Paul Ingles producer of Peace Talks Radio the series on peacemaking and nonviolent conflict resolution in 2013 we marked 10 years of Peace Talks Radio programs our home radio station k.u.n.c. Am in Albuquerque New Mexico had us on the air to talk about the history of the show and to talk with some of our listeners the conversation led to a clip of one of our favorite guests from all those years so stay tuned for that Elaine bombard Ok u n n news director hosted the show which featured Suzanne Kreiter our cofounder and host who was on the line from Washington d.c. At the time one of our other hosts Carol Boss in the studio along with myself we even talked about conflicts we had between ourselves and trying to pick our guests like Eric Cole that the meditation teacher on our 1st program we heard from earlier and other ways we bugged each other to here's a lame bomb Kartel and wondering Suzanne. When you look back at this decade of producing the show why did what is maybe the deepest and most impactful area of your life that has been affected Oh well well I try not to lose it but I often do and I always try to go back to you know heaven my own feelings and hopefully like no other prisoner has their feelings somehow we think can play too bad conflict isn't bad it gets a truth out so it's affected me in terms of being a little bit more on this. I think when Paul and I are married games with the idea of the show and I often say it was the only child that we had so it takes me deeply in that I feel like the legacy that Paul and I have given to the world was to look this is what's important to us we're not that good at it but we know I think people are really trying thanks. How did you how in those early days how were you selecting the folks that you were choosing to interview on the show taco called arses want to call up Paul talk about this that he wouldn't want to keep exterior and that's we had a fight about Erik because Erik is moved and and also that oh we shouldn't have a good just on but we want people originally who were in New Mexico but over the years we realized that nationally and internationally there were people who were making peace but we wanted to open the show well call Paul was that your was that you're going to clarify it was well it wasn't that they had a version to having Buddhists on the program I think it was well I think it was the fact that the 1st show that we were going to be putting out nationally I didn't want it to be to sound like we were choosing a religion and religious take on things now the thing with Eric is that he's just he's just a pure philosophical thinker who happens to be Buddhist in my mind I mean that's where it came down to being a perfect program. But I think that. When . She says that I wanted to be pure We take the town hall the tagline of our program seriously and that the program is about peacemaking and nonviolent conflict resolution that's a pretty broad plate to work with or canvas to paint on. So I challenge all of us as host when we're thinking about programs can we bring this back to that is it is it about making peace is it about conflict resolution and I think Carol's got frustrated with me sometimes to try to force that connection a little bit in something that is clearly something that's good for the community you know so that if it's good for the community it's good for reducing conflict and fostering peace but I think it's important for us since that's our mission to make sure that that connection is is very clear so that it doesn't seem like. Just sort of a broadly defined public affairs program Carol Well I think I've gotten frustrated with you over something it's called but I don't know if that's exactly it because for me. I've been able to. Have doing this program has allowed me to make discoveries no I wouldn't say on a daily basis about seeing and understanding peace and has allowed me to see it maybe going from the macro to the micro level where I see small pieces of peace in life and make that connection in terms of. For example we wound up doing I hosted a program on does climate change threaten peace and there was also a program we did on canned water negotiations around the world point the way to peace and I don't know if I ever would have thought about those global issues and bringing to the level of thinking about peace between communities and nations and individuals so it's just been the surprising discovery of how. We can look at you know for me I like small pieces of peace I like saying that and and making and making the connection which are talking about Paul it happens it happens all the time and I'd love to hear from listeners who we do we have a few callers let's let's go to Scott in Albuquerque could morning Scott you're on the air Good morning thanks I just had a comment and then a question and my comment was Love Peace Talks Radio so I'm going to answer for a long time and I wish that either it would get produced more or tell you what I meant quite more often because I think it's really so wonderful so so thank you for . My question was. In hearing the story of how Peace Talks Radio came about. You know kind of a response to 911 I've recently sort of formed a group I guess. With some people locally as a response to. The Newtown shootings. In a very similar way kind of bringing people together to mourn but then also talk about what are we going to do how are we going to make a difference many of us are parents we have small children you know I think that tragedy really struck home for a lot of people. And we talked about doing some different things one thing that we've talked about doing is having some kind of like a piece therapy story or something like that in a local park and. What I'm wondering from from from the folks on the show is if they can speak to how to keep a group like that going how to keep that momentum going how to add some longevity to it because obviously the Peace Talks Radio. Started small like that and has survived all these years and has really taken off and I guess I think it's just an amazing resource and so I'm wondering if you have any. You know ideas are thoughts on how to fix keep the momentum of this little group that I've become involved has gone. Well 1st of all congratulations for that and I hope that if you can we get your e-mail to Carol because we are working on you know a program well let's do it we'll have you hang on the line after you've made some comment just don't hang up Ok Ok And our producer will get your information. Yeah. You know how to keep it going I thought this think that you do a little bit every week on a project like that we interviewed Nobel Peace Prize laureate Jody Williams. Carol talked with her when she was at a conference years ago. And she's kind of a hard nosed character in a way you know and she says basically get off your butt and do so I think you know I don't care what you do just do something and even if you're just doing an hour a month toward an organization then them do that if you're taking your own personal project though just set some parameters about how to fit it into your other worlds and just make sure that you're moving it forward a little bit in a methodical way. As far as the peace talks story goes we volunteered for 2 years that we did set up a nonprofit organization so that we could accept contributions because we thought that if people heard about and believed what we were doing mostly friends and family at 1st that they would start sending some contributions we are independent from k u n m in that way so that we are our own nonprofit organization called good radio shows incorporated and of course that support has built once you've done some work and had some advance and proven your mettle as it were then I think you can start going to some foundations who support peace work there aren't enough of them out there we've been blessed here in New Mexico to have the support of the McCune charitable foundation and several of our seasons also the on. And hammer Brothers Foundation has been a wonderful supporting entity for several years now people find out about what you do you take responsibility for spreading the word a little bit maybe you can get some of the support that you need to to create the events and the programs that you believe in let's take another call. Suzanne did you have a comment well I do Scott thank you so much for calling because I really believe that everyone could do something people looked at us a year in case you know you can do this but really everyone can do something and so it's awesome your joints up and I would say to peace one keep it positive so so often we're like oh Columbine you know we're negative for new counter negative or just keep the positive your piece here is a great idea and the 2nd see is priority always make it a priority that you do something like Paul said a little bit every month and don't expect that people are good just write to you just keep it positive and make it a priority thing. Let's take another call Joni in Albuquerque could morning John you're on the air Hi Can you hear me yes ma'am Ok I I have been listening to peace talks for a cup you know for some time and I think it's a great one question or one idea I got was I answer I got it from peace talks was that you can teach peace in the schools and I was just wondering if anything was going on I mean I think that. If there can be a little bit of a. Of awareness of what people can do to encourage peace maybe elementary school junior high high school and it just seems to me I got that idea from peace talks and I was just wondering if anything was going on in New Mexico. I'm. I think I've got to go ahead Ken I I don't know the names or what schools but I think that that has been happening to some degree in in the Mexico and maybe Paul you have some specifics that you can think of well I don't have a lot I mean we did a program on Youth Voices once and I know that there are surprise Graham at the Universalist Unitarian church where they have peace programs for young kids and we interviewed some of them that have some clips of them we could listen to later but it's just amazing you know what what the young people came up with. I'd like to hear more about what's going on but I don't know when what does teaching. Look like in a classroom will let me bring together some of the things that we've talked about because one of the shows that Carol did that was particularly moving also speaks to this business about keeping a positive. Forgiveness personal responsibility in January 1995. A fellow named who was an investment banker in San Diego his son to reek who was in his young twenty's he was shot and killed by a 14 year old gang member who'd been challenged by his gang to shoot into a car and happen to shoot into the pizza delivery car that to wreak was an end to wreak died the 14 year old Tony Hicks was sentenced to prison so to reach that is Aseem communities and instead of pursuing any revenge against the killers family he ended up teaming up with Tony Hicks his grandfather to start teaching nonviolence courses in the schools in San Diego at 1st and now he's doing it all around the country he set up a foundation and over the years they just reach tens of thousands of students and programs that he described to Carol and we're going to listen to that one right now . There are 6 key messages that we try and impart in this in this life and live assemblies in this era of media and read it video games with images that are there to fill with guns and violence that are so pervasive in this culture and is so attractive to youth How is making good choices and violent choices presented in a way that draws them in that is appealing to young students and something that they. Want to actually do. And this is a good question you're right the violence is extremely pervasive we are by far the most violent 1st one nation in the world by the time our kids get a great day they've seen 800000 images of violence but I started with a very simple premise that violence is a learned behavior nobody was born violent No none of our children were born violent but if you accept that violence is a learned behavior nonviolence can also be a learned behavior but who teaches at t. Care if we do teach it and let me answer your question by an example we have a lesson on empathy. And empathy is a big word in some of these middle schools we usually have a theme when the theme when empathy is I don't know you till I walk a mile in your shoes and you don't know me until you walk a mile in my shoes and this was a 7th grader his name was Alex in 7th grade and Holt had all the signs the swear the encounter the colors you could see a want to be a gang member written all over this kid and and somehow this lesson and empathy got to him. And they used then the homework is that they have to practice empathy for the whole week and the week after before they get their lesson in compassion they asked to share their homework on empathy and when the teacher asks Who wants to share their lesson on empathy it was Alec's Now remember this is a kid this is a most deceptive kid in the class and what he shared that was very powerful and what he said is I was walking in my hood last weekend and this kid gave me a dirty angry look the rules of the Who are they are if the kid gives you a dirty angry look you go beat him up but because you're taught to me that you don't know need to walk a mile in my shoes and I don't know you till I walk a mile in your shoes I walked up with this kid and said Why are you giving me a dirty look so the kid said to me I'm not giving you a dirty look I'm angry because my brother was shot and killed last night so what did you do next I held his hand. We cried together. I gave him a hug I told him I know how you feel because I lost my uncle 6 months ago one lesson and you think this kid walks the hood every we can't tell me you can't teach no Munce is the part of this which would could have been. A finite became a compassionate action you know one of the key messages we teach is that from conflict love and unity are possible a clip from this interview that Carol Boss did. You'll have to remind me the names Paul to me so busy I'm coming. This particular show is the one that this is the one. This is the one that I remember listening to as it was airing on and I cried at a certain point because this. The way that this father had. Dealt with the grief and the sorrow at the loss of his son was to stop that cycle of violence and to try to perpetuate. A nonviolent outcome well he's saw. Victims of both ends of the gun and recognizing that a 14 year old gang member who was being challenged to shoot. Certainly had to take some responsibility for his actions but he says the Basically that's the product of a culture of violence that we all have a responsibility to do something about you can hear the full programmes from which all these excerpts were taken online at Peace Talks Radio dot com And of course there's the equivalent of a full peace studies curriculum on that site scores of programs on peacemaking and nonviolent conflict resolution Peace Talks Radio dot com our work on this project is supported by the nonprofit organization good radio shows incorporated your tax deductible financial support is appreciated learn how you can donate at Peace Talks Radio dot com support also comes from the McCune charitable foundation of New Mexico and caring businesses like a spinal health a movement center and Ruben Ramirez and Albuquerque's Nob Hill neighborhood nowadays Moses is the executive director of good radio shows incorporated Allie Adelman composed and performs our theme music I'm Paul Ingles Thanks for listening to and for supporting Peace Talks Radio. 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