|
Tuesday, 12 September 2006 18:41 |
| | Janese Johnson |
One of the many great things about Asheville ÇƒÏ besides the wonderful mountains, people and great music ÇƒÏ is that it draws numerous authors on the speaking circuit.
Recently, an extraordinary man named Claude Anshin Thomas shared from his book " At Hellës Gate" with a fairly large group of people over at UNC Ashevilleës Lipinsky Auditorium. His book tells of his extraordinary journey on how he overcame the adversity and trauma that he experienced throughout his life.
Claude
grew up in an alcoholic home with abusive parents that beat him
regularly and showed very little affection and care for their only
child. He grew up in a military family and that is what was expected of
him, too. So without a whole lot of thought, he joined the military at
18 years of age during the Vietnam War. He became quite a good fighter
and killed a lot of people. He shares quite a few details in his book.
He was thrilled
to get back to the states. When he was at the airport he spotted a very
attractive woman, and being a normal young adult male, he was quite
excited that she noticed him. She walked over to him, and he grew more
excited. Just as she was right in front of him, and he looked up
smiling a big smile at this beautiful young woman, she spit on him and
called him a bunch of obscenities for being in the military.
Shock is not
even the word that describes his reaction to his welcoming party ÇƒÏ and
that experience affected him quite deeply. He spiraled into a deep and
dark abyss for many years until he ended up in rehab. From that point
on Claude started a new and interesting journey. He became a Buddhist
monk, and now calls himself a peace activist.
In his talk he
shares with us the difference in his opinion between the two. An
anti-war person is someone who uses anger as a way to create change.
Such people are angry and do not feel that their anger might even be
the same emotion that has brought on many wars. Claude sees that the
use of anger only perpetuates the very thing that we are wanting to
stop.
A peace activist
is a person who uses peace as a way to achieve that goal. Gandhi has a
quote similar to this thinking, "We must become the change that we want
to see in the world." It definitely makes sense that if we truly want
peace than we need to embrace that in our own self. That does not mean
to sit around and mediate and pray and hope for change. It means to be
active, but with the goal of peace as the intention, not the goal to
take down our enemy.
On the care2.com
website, where there is a lot of networking; petition signing; blogs;
and uncensored news available, I have seen this anti-war mentality a
lot, and I have also seen the peace activist mentality there, too. It
is quite interesting when looking for the difference how obvious it is.
It has also been
interesting for me now that my son has joined the Navy. I can see my
own judgments about his position. When he graduated boot camp the other
week, I was walking in town with him while he was in uniform, and the
responses that we experienced were quite obvious. People seemed to
react everywhere we went in one of two ways. They would comment on how
wonderful for him and they shared a military story ÇƒÏ or they openly
trashed Bush and the war in front of my son, as if he had something to
do with any of that.
Even though I do
not agree with much of what is happening in the military or political
front, I realized that my son is not a whole lot different than many of
the young men and women who are joining the military now. They are
young and idealistic and really do not seem to have a clear sense on
what their commitment entails.
I asked Claude
what his great wisdom was for me regarding my son, and he suggested to
just love him and support him because he has already made his decision
and all my "anti-war" talking isnët going to change that. So I know it
is for me to really come from a place of peace since that is what I
really would like to see for all of us.
ï
Janese Johnson
has been doing intuitive counseling nationally for more than 20 years.
She may be contacted at janesej-at-buncombe.main.nc.us.
|
