Be the Flower, Not the Gun

I was in the Azores (the islands off the coast of Portugal) leading a yoga retreat the week that there was a school shooting back home at Evergreen High School, and Charlie Kirk was killed. These are just two examples of gun violence that have become all too familiar in the United States. Mass shootings have become almost commonplace, and political violence is escalating.

The current administration blames the other side, but violence exists on both sides. There was the murder of Democratic state lawmaker Melissa Hortman and her husband in Minnesota, an assault on Nancy Pelosi’s husband, and, of course, the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021.

Perhaps the most alarming thing I’ve read recently is a 2024 study by the UC Davis Violence Prevention Research Program (VPRP), which found that 26.2% of people in the U.S. believe violence is usually or always justified to advance a political objective.

Ironically, while all of this was happening at home, I was exploring Angra do Heroísmo in Terceira and learning about the peaceful Carnation Revolution, which occurred in Portugal on April 25, 1974. It is well known for being a largely peaceful military coup that overthrew the authoritarian Estado Novo regime, which had been in power for over 40 years.