Plenary, 03 Feb 2010

Meeting date: Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Official Report 418KB pdf

---

Time for Reflection

Good afternoon. The first item of business is time for reflection. Our time for reflection leader is Rose Goodenough, from the Scottish Inter Faith Council.

Om shanti—greetings of peace. We are witnessing enormous changes in the world in many ways and are passing through transformational times, where history is being shaped once again. It is as if the crises that we face and the suffering that results are too much for humanity and the earth to bear. We deserve a better world for ourselves and our children—a world of peace, justice and compassion. How can we bring about the change that we seek? In whose hands is it to implement this change? It is in the hands of all of us—together! Hand in hand, step by step, we can move forward making the right thoughtful choices at every moment, being kind and compassionate towards life in all its forms.

As children of God, we are all one family. The greatest act of charity at this time is to share compassionate love with all—to share our pure feelings and good wishes with each one. For that, we need the foundation of our own inner peace. Is it possible to create personal peace in a world of ever-increasing chaos and change? Even one minute of peace can affect the whole of your day and several minutes can affect the whole of your life. As a former senior police officer, who is now a leadership development specialist, said:

"One minute is enough to make the greatest decision of your life."

Today, I would like to invite you to consider introducing regular one-minute periods of silence into your busy schedule. If you are calm, steady and focused and at peace with yourself, you can make phenomenal decisions in one minute, and these may be decisions that profoundly affect the lives of many others.

I invite you to practise the art of inner peace. Taking just a minute, we can relax. As peace becomes a friend, we recognise its power. Calm thoughts and pure feelings permeate the atmosphere, influencing the mood of the room, creating an environment of ease and comfort and offering wellbeing. This inner peace is stable, deep and strong. From this place of inner peace, there is clarity and wisdom. Drop by drop, we create moments of peace, sprinkling them on to the world, touching hearts, reigniting hope—at one with the world.

I invite you to share such moments of peace once an hour, wherever you are, whatever you are doing. Om shanti.