Intergenerational Moments Teach Us All

Learning occurs across generations and decades. The grey hairs learn from the tow-headed. The smooth, supple skin learns bits of wisdom from the crepey skin and age spots.

Openness, curiosity, listening, gleaning . . . Peace Village grounds itself in the wealth of nourishment found within the community. By its very identity as a “village,” our time together intends to bring together diverse ages, beliefs, experiences, and so many more differences within our population, so that we can learn from one another across our differences.

We believe in an expanded version of the African proverb, “it takes a village to raise a child.” It takes a village to understand the broad influence of media. It will take a village to address climate change and relearn the need to connect to nature. It must utilize the village to work through conflict finding resolution. And the village knows peace when its inhabitants practice mindfulness through intentional body movement, meditation, and self-care.

Peace must flow across generations for the village to flourish. Specifically, our time with the Mediation and Restorative Justice Center in January invited us ALL into “talking circles.” After spending time together making “talking sticks” to take back with our families, we learned some ways to listen and be curious about the differences among us that expand and deepen our relationships. Instead of learning more ways to separate us – we learned the gift of being a whole village.