Life gives us sign posts to remind us that we are on the right path. Love points the way if we open our heart and see with it.

Seeing the memorials to the victims of the latest terrorist attacks in London and experiencing the raw emotion of the family of one of the victims I was given a poignant reminder that I am on the right path with the journey of peace I am about to undertake.

Love Thy Self

I arrived in London early this morning. After more than twenty four hours traveling and with little sleep I was pretty shattered. I thought I’d hit the ground running upon dropping off my bag at the apartment. Instead I decided to take a nap – to start nurturing myself rather than the usual pushing myself to the limits.

Just days before the recent London terror attacks we had booked my accommodation. I am staying merely a few hundred metres away from the events of days ago.

Conquering Fear

Having heard on the news before embarking on my flight I was determined not to get sucked into the hysteria of fear and lose my centre.

What I experienced this evening has had a profound effect on me, however, not in the way I had expected.

Before leaving Australia I purposely didn’t watch much of the news coverage about the latest London Terrorist attacks. I didn’t want to be fearful walking the streets of London. This was a wise move. As I caught the tube in the morning to get to my accommodation I was seeing every day Londoners getting along doing their own thing, rushing to work and boarding the tube. It seemed just another day in London. It was as if the events of the last few days hadn’t happened…strange.

Honouring The Victims

However, in the evening as I walked along Borough High Street I began to see memorials to the victims of the last few days events. I poised and paid my respects to the victims and began reading the messages amongst the wreaths. But it didn’t quite hit home till I reached a wall with stick it notes. I was moved by the family of one of the victims.

There was a photograph of the victim on the memorial wall and the family were crying in grief for their son, their brother.

It was a highly charged moment of a deep outpouring of sadness and grief that was felt by all those who stood by.

Strangers were united in expressing their sympathy as they felt the family’s pain. All the sadness and pain was evident in the faces in the crowd. Men with eyes filled with tears, women sobbing. Others standing silently trying to contain themselves.

I too felt moved and my eyes welled and my lip trembled. I didn’t expect it but it brought home to me just how human we all are. Just how we can feel pain of total strangers. In that moment of vulnerability we were all one family.

One Love

It brought home to me that we are all connected through our humanity. One of the wreaths had a message that read ‘One Love’. It is this uniting of the human spirit that often reveals itself through tragedy.

Courage Through Strength

It also became clear that Londoners were showing their solidarity by not giving into fear. They stoically go about their business not forgetting what had just happened. Instead with courage and that British stiff upper lip they Carry On with their lives not giving in to terror and fear.

Keep Calm And Carry On

The spirit of the morale boosting ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ propaganda and publicity campaign that the Ministry of Information started in World War continues in the hearts and spirits of Londoners.

Evil/Live

Londoners are living their lives and defying evil. They will not give in to fear but instead know that they have to keep living and loving to defeat evil.

Have you ever noticed that the world ‘evil’ spelled backwards spells ‘live’? I wrote an article on this once and no doubt will expand on this in a future blog article.

Londoners instead of ‘flipping out’ are instead ‘flipping it’.

That is they are flipping the situation, the energy. It is an internal process of flipping fear into love and creating transformation in the process. So from what seems like business as usual from the outside for Londoners begins with an internal shift.

They are also flipping evil by simply choosing to live. Together they change the separitist ‘i’ into the collective and uniting ‘o’ or oneness. By choosing to l(i)ve they are choosing l(o)ve.

Solidarity

My journey that I am on is about letting go of my own personal fear.

Fear has a way of keeping us small.

Fear when projected can divide us. My journey is about embracing love and letting go of fear that separates and divides us. It is one of great learning and making internal shifts in myself in order that I can be of service to others.

It is about seeing the fear in the world that divides us. It is about compassion for others.

It is about not standing still while others suffer. It is about not seeing events on the television and feeling so far removed but knowing that even though it is happening a world away doesn’t mean it is a world away from our hearts.

Just today I felt Londoners have given me a beautiful message of love. I just had to look a little deeper to find it and experience it.

This is a walk of solidarity. Together we are solid, fear cannot divide us. We are all one. One love.

Love

I left my message on the wall this evening. Just one word, ‘LOVE’.

Remember to love one another. Remember to love yourself.

Lovedon

Londoners this evening have given me the gift of their strength. Simply by looking a little below the surface I could see that what looks like business as usual in a city that has experienced recent tragedy was actually hidden strength. A city that was conquering fear through strength and quiet compassion.

They are a city of ‘lovedoners’.

Evolution

This marks the start of an incredible life-changing journey of love. Through love I hope to evolve. Again ‘love’ spelled backwards becomes the beginning of the word ‘evolve’. In time, I hope to understand what those two last letters are.

Hope to share more  moments with you along the way.

With love,

David