Willie Nelson

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We have now passed our 150th post and by all the metrics and indicators we are moving forward with a great acceleration. More importantly, not only are we reaching more people but also more people are participating.

We have seen some people pick up an audio file of “A Peaceful Solution” and make a video. We have seen even more people record their own versions of “A Peaceful Solution.”

Willie Nelson has been on the road making music at one venue after another and still has found ways to connect back to us here with email. He lets us know that he has been checking the Willie Nelson Peace Research Institute website. He lets us know he has seen the videos and listened to the other versions of “A Peaceful Solution.”

After the first flurry of other musicians submitting their versions of “A Peaceful Solution” we commented to Willie about the high quality and diversity of the versions.

Willie replied:

Hi Liz and Jay,
This is great. Thanks.

”One person can not change the world, maybe, but one person can carry the message that will change the world.”

I don’t know who said that but it sounds right.

Aloha,
Willie

This echoes the thought that nothing is more potent than an idea whose time has come. But it also shows how encouraging it is to everyone involved, including Willie Nelson, for other people to pick up that idea and pass it along.

It is too easy to be either pushed into alienated cynicism or drawn back into retreat towards slack jawed acceptance of bald-faced lies. No thinking compassionate creative person desires either position.

Our challenge, and this includes everyone not excepting Willie, is to find another place. By example people have stepped up and shown that through the sharing of creative work we can inhabit another place.

Always, regardless of our past successes, there is the lingering doubt that our efforts have gone unnoticed. Always there is at least a small fear that our work was for nothing. And it is at these times that the first feedback lends us the strength to continue.

I can only speak for myself but I can suspect that this is true for everyone.

I have directed film, theatre and video productions. I have spoken in front of many people. I have launched countless websites. Regardless of the preparatory work I have done, irrespective of my past accomplishments and ignoring my assumption of self-confidence in my abilities there are always doubts.

It is a challenge to adequately express the joy I experience when all doubts are put to rest with the first feedback.

Eventually, more people come and participate. A few more people make a video. More still record their versions of “A Peaceful Solution.”

We are quick to share these moments with Willie, to tell him that we are not alone and that there are others out there who we have never met who share an idea whose time has come. People from all over the United States of America and from other lands share the idea of “A Peaceful Solution.”

Willie wrote back:

Hi Liz and Jay,
Please tell everyone who has sang ”A Peaceful Solution” how proud it makes me to see so many talented people singing and playing my song.

It just proves that we are all on the same page.

Let’s keep the revolution going.

Aloha and peace.
Willie

I don’t have to imagine that Willie is happy that the idea is gaining support. Here he said it himself.

And I have to share it with you. I have to let you know that you have been heard. I have to let you know that you are not alone.

Most importantly I have to let you know that you neither need believe the lies nor succumb to alienated cynicism.

I must do this for you because you have done this for us.

And now we must do this for yet more people.

So reach out and encourage others to sing “A Peaceful Solution.” Encourage others to make a video to one of the versions or to make a video to their own version.

And please, by all and any means, let us know so we can share it with others.

I’d like to close with three of my favorite Willie Nelson quotations:

I believe in dreams and dreamers, being one myself.

You can’t always change the circumstances of your life, but you can change your perceptions of those circumstances and of the world around you by any creative act. Create.

I believe that creative imagination rules the universe.

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Tags: Arts, Peace, Willie Nelson

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