ADNAN JABER

ADNAN JABER

Ambassador of the Future This is Inheritance of Peace and I’m Amy Shimshon-Santo. Today we meet with Adnan Jaber, a distinguished technology expert, polyglot, and peace builder who recently presented at the Global Nobel Peace Summit. Born and raised in Jerusalem, he credits his love for bringing people together to his mother, and his fascination with technology to his father. He explains his commitment to peacemaking as a natural “survival instinct” in response to the conditions he has experienced. For Jaber, peace is both “the safest path” and also “one of the most dangerous.” I’m excited to welcome you into our discussion about his life and inheritance of peace. Adnan Jaber (AJ): Recording in progress. Amy Shimshon-Santo (Dr. A): Recording in progress. Life in progress. Communication in progress. AJ: I feel this is going to be poetic. Dr. A: Knowing you, and knowing me, it probably will be. And then we’ll go dance. By the way, that video of you dancing at your wedding! Goodness gracious. AJ: Thank you, I really enjoyed that time. Dr. A: That was amazing. AJ: I was very happy. Dr. A: You deserve to be. Alright, my dear, the first question today is, Who are you? AJ: Who am I, Adnan Jaber. I’m a human. Curious person, loving, a lover, proud husband of Michal Greenfield. [https://youtu.be/PJCYGGHwooY?si=VaS-HIVub6Ogq8QQ] An innovator, technologist, who loves to bring people together. Help them find what they have in common. An explorer. Born and raised in Jerusalem, now living in Los Angeles. What else would you like to know about me? “I’m a human. A curious person, loving, a lover, proud husband of Michal Greenfield. I’m an innovator and technologist who loves to bring people together and help them find what they have in common.” Dr. A: Lots. My next question is about, not just who you are and how you self-define, but what do you get to do with your life force? AJ: What do I get to do with my life force? And when you shared with me life force, you meant, what am I living for? What am I using my life for? If I get it right… Dr. A: I think that’s a great way to get it. AJ: Okay. Where do I want to go with my life force? I’ll share it with a story, how about that? Dr. A: Beautiful. AJ: So, I come from a Muslim family. In Islam, my teacher in the school taught me… I should say, “My teacher’s Islam taught me” because every Muslim has a different way of looking at it as well. I don’t want to overgeneralize things. My teacher taught me that life started as Adam and Eve. They came from heaven. They came to Earth. This is how humanity started. And then heaven and hell is how it’s gonna end. If you pray five times a day, if you fast Ramadan, and if you behave like a good person, that’s how you’re gonna go to heaven. If you don’t, you’re gonna go to hell. That became kind of the meaning of my life as a young Muslim boy. Everything I did was to go to heaven. Later I got into an exchange program to study in the U.S. in Washington D.C. I visited The Museum of Natural History [https://naturalhistory.si.edu/], the Smithsonian Museum, and there I saw the bones of evolution. Evolution of plants first. And then I saw the evolution of animals. How the bones changed over time. Then I saw human evolution. How the skull changed from the ape to the human. That shocked me because it contradicted the story of Adam and Eve. Humanity started this way. I started having questions. I started doubting the religion and its perfection. I still appreciate its traditions and its goals to bring people together and do healing. But I was questioning the meaning of life, and what do we live for? I started doubting heaven and hell, the way it’s been described. I don’t know if there’s gonna be heaven and hell. That was a very scary moment for me. I was 19 years old. I started asking questions of sheikhs, priests, rabbis. I didn’t get the answers that were stronger than what I saw in the museum. I became very curious, but also very afraid. What am I living for? What’s the meaning of my life? Some suicidal thoughts even came to my life. I didn’t get the answers from the religious leaders. So later, I went to Google and I searched, “what do we live for?” Dr. A: You did not. AJ: There wasn’t AI at the time. I opened the first article, and it started talking about suicide. And it said, “Don’t think about committing suicide. Think about all the people who love you, and how you’re gonna hurt them. This is a very selfish decision. Even if you think you’re gonna be freeing yourself, you’re gonna be hurting a lot of other people. And then it said, if you want to know the meaning of life, look at the babies. The moment they are born they start to touch everything to put in their mouth to taste. They are curious. They want to explore, and that’s our natural drive. To survive and to explore. That moved me, somehow. I really liked it. It explained a lot of things that were happening in my mind and in my body. Then I started seeking that — to explore more. To do what I am made to do. And I wanted to know what’s bigger than a galaxy [https://science.nasa.gov/mission/hubble/]? What’s smaller than an atom [https://www.britannica.com/science/quark]? What makes us love more? What makes us live a happier life? And to know the answers for these questions, we need to bring people together because together they can explore further. Many minds are smarter than one mind. That has become kind of the mission of my life. It’s to bring people together to explore further and more. That’s why I said in my identity, a curious person. “I wanted to know what’s bigger than a galaxy? What’s smaller than an atom? What makes us love more? What makes us live a happier life? To know the answers for these questions, we need to bring people together because together they can explore further. Many minds are smarter than one mind. That has become the mission of my life.” Dr. A: Yes. AJ: Yeah, it became my identity today. Yeah, so I was 19. Today I’m 31. I’ve been on that journey since then. So that’s my life force, I guess. Dr. A: Beautiful. And it’s amazing how choosing a story went right to the heart of that question. AJ: Yeah. Dr. A: Fantastic. AJ: It wasn’t easy to go through this journey. To be very doubtful of your beliefs. Dr. A: Especially at 19. You are already legally an adult. You didn’t have science classes on evolution when you were young? AJ: I had science classes. Dr. A: You didn’t feel and see viscerally the evidence of all of that. AJ: They didn’t even talk much about the evolution thing. They talked about other things. But they didn’t try to challenge the religious aspects very much. Dr. A: Sounds like a breakthrough. AJ: It is. Nothing happened in one day, or in one sitting. Asking priests and sheikhs. Trying to find meaning in my life. It took almost one or two years in the process. Dr. A: It’s still very fast. And I love that you’re a tech guy, “and so, I asked Google.” And there was no AI yet. AJ: There’s a lot of responsibility on the tech companies. And now AI is there. Actually, I asked ChatGPT two days ago, “what’s the question you get the most from people?” It told me, “We don’t have specific analysis about every conversation, but, generally, the question is, “What’s the meaning of life?” That’s the question ChatGPT has the most. Dr. A: So you have an AI presence. Right? AJ: I have an AI clone. Dr. A: Don’t you have a regional problem solving AI? AJ: I have one too. Yeah. AS: Do you want to say what that is about? AJ: It’s a custom GPT. It’s an AI that I uploaded some documents to and gave it some custom instructions. I created other custom GPTs, one for ALLMEP [https://www.allmep.org/], and another for Aziz Abu-Sarah and Maoz Inon (Authors of The Future Is Peace [https://thefutureispeace.com/]). Dr. A: Great book. AJ: This book has a lot of great answers. Anyone can ask any question, get the immediate answer. [https://chatgpt.com/g/g-676defd0891081918859b39e8aab3872-adnan-jaber]Yeah. We need to meet people where they are as well. Not everyone is able to go to do academic research to find the answer for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to understand the different solutions out there and everything. Not everyone has the time. People need to be able to receive answers in their own language, in their own accent, at their own time. Dr. A: Yeah. Well, that leads to our next question, which is “What lands are you connected to?” AJ: I’m connected to the land of Palestine Israel, and to the United States of America. Dr. A: Do you want to say anything about your relationship to those connections or the land? AJ: I’m born and raised in Jerusalem to a Muslim, Palestinian, Arab family. But, you know, Jerusalem is under the authority of Israel, a Jewish country. So I lived both realities in the same place, as a Palestinian and as an Israeli because I had an Israeli ID. I don’t have an Israeli passport. Which is another problem to talk about. Dr. A: You do not have, or you do have? Adnan Jaber: I don’t have any passport. I’m a stateless person. I’m a 31 year old stateless person. Dr. A: Hmm. AJ: My parents don’t have the Israeli passport, but they were born and raised also in Jerusalem. Before 1967. Before Israel announced East Jerusalem as parts of its territory, back then people had Jordanian passports. So I got a Jordanian passport, but I didn’t have Jordanian nationality, or a Jordanian ID. Living in Jerusalem, in Israel. Working in Israel, I wanted an Israeli passport. Dr. A: Right. AJ: Also, I wanted the right to vote, to feel protected in that country. So I applied to get it. In the application, they asked me to revoke my Jordanian passport, and I did. But the process to get the Israeli passport is really hard. It takes years. So many interviews. Long periods to wait between each interview and the other, like six months to one year. So I was almost three years in this process. My last interview was supposed to be on October 11th, 2023. But October 7th happened right before that. The Ministry of Interior in Israel told me, “We’ll see you after the war.” Dr. A: The war goes on and on. AJ: The war goes on and on. I was visiting L.A. during that time, so Michal and I stayed in L.A. and continued to live in L.A. I have a green card. Married to Michal. Hopefully, inshallah, in one year, I’ll get the American passport. Dr. A: Wonderful. AJ: Yeah. Dr. A: Stateless person, but not a landless person. AJ: Yeah, many lands. Dr. A: No passport. AJ: No nationality. No passport. Dr. A: Well, that’s interesting, environmentally. AJ: I’m connected to the people too! Dr. A: Yeah. AJ: The land and the people. I have a lot of Palestinian friends and family. A lot of Israeli friends. I speak Arabic and Hebrew and English. Yeah, there’s a bug in the system. Dr. A: There’s many. There’s more than a bug. There’s a break. There is a fracture. AJ: Yeah. Dr. A: There is a big break. I have so many more questions about that stuff. We could riff on that for a while because my mom is from Jerusalem and her family were stateless for 28 years. AJ: Hmm. Dr. A: When they got to the Middle East, at the turn of the century, they were stateless for 28 years. When my great-great-grandfather died, my great-great-grandmother had to complain about getting citizenship because you could only apply for citizenship through the husband. The man was the only one who could apply. A woman did not have that right. I’ve found these papers. They’re in Arabic, Hebrew, and English because of the British Mandate. Colonial rule. It’s just wild to me. Isn’t citizenship key to any democracy? Doesn’t it exist to protect everyone? It’s horrible that you are from there, and experience that same fucked up circumstance so many years later. AJ: So you understand. Dr. A: Yes, dear. AJ: I’m not protected by anyone, so my freedom of speech has been limited all my life. Politics, joining or supporting any political party, is a really big question in my head. Doing anything publicly is a real danger for me. Administrative detention in Israel is a serious thing. I.C.E. here in the U.S. is a serious threat, and in the Palestine Territories freedom of speech is not safe. Dr. A: Yet, I see you so courageously and peacefully and calmly and elegantly navigating through all these different spaces. I’ve watched you listen, and I’ve listened to you speak. AJ: What can we say? I also come from Jerusalem. Jerusalem is a capital. I’m a city boy. We learned how to talk. My father is a salesman. Dr. A: Well, that served you well. “My freedom of speech has been limited all my life. Politics, joining or supporting any political party, is a really big question in my head. Doing anything publicly is a real danger for me. Administrative detention in Israel is a serious thing. I.C.E. here in the U.S. is a serious threat, and in the Palestine Territories freedom of speech is not safe.” AJ: I’m really looking forward to getting my American citizenship. Yes, I’ll get the protection that I need and all of that. But I love the United States of America despite all of its problems. Still, it’s the melting pot. The most diverse place. I love the values that the U.S. stands for, and it should stand for. So, yeah, I look forward to that. Dr. A: How was it for you to come from the Middle East to the U.S.? Come from Jerusalem and see so many different kinds of people from all over? I know people visit Jerusalem that way, too. AJ: I see a lot of internationals in Jerusalem. Coming to the U.S., I got to see more Arabs. Iraqis, Syrians, Lebanese. I never saw these people in Jerusalem. It was shocking because I have a lot in common with these people. They live near me, and I never got to see them. But in the U.S., I got to see them. Egyptians, too. Because its not easy to come to Jerusalem, as you know. It’s really hard. I got to see a lot of African people too, in the U.S. And Indians. That was eye-opening. Yeah, the U.S. is another place. Dr. A: Yeah, and you’re a very important part of it here. I’ve been following your presence since we met initially through Standing Together. [https://www.standing-together.org/en] Then, in your tech and communications, your approach moved me. I always felt, Wow, that guy is amazing. Is there anything else you want to say about connection to land? To be from someplace, and yet be so far away from everyone around you, and then to be able to encounter people from your own region of birth here in the U.S. AJ: Yeah. I think you got it. If I have more thoughts on it, I’ll share it with you. Dr. A: Yes, sir. Alright. So, we’re going to turn now to the inheritance of peace. We’ve talked about this a little bit as aspirational peace. Back in the day, I saw you posting videos saying, “There’s a third way.” I thought, What is going on in the mind of this man? What is the aspirational insight of this human being? I’m very curious to hear what your inheritance of peace is. Why does it call to you? How does it call to you? And what do you do about it? AJ: I’ll share with you how I got into this world, and why I’m still choosing that. This is my classic story that I keep telling. So enjoy it. Born and raised in Jerusalem to an Arab, Muslim, Palestinian family. I didn’t have one single Jewish friend for 22 years of my life, even though I lived in Jerusalem, the capital of the Jews. I see Jews every day on the train, on the bus, whenever I move around in Jerusalem. Why didn’t I have a single Jewish friend? Because I didn’t speak Hebrew, and those neighbors didn’t speak Arabic. There was a big lack of trust and misunderstanding. And all I hear about the Jews is not from them, but either from my community or Al Jazeera [https://www.aljazeera.com/], and it was usually not the good things. Unfortunately, in the media, what bleeds leads. That’s how it works. My father has an electronics shop. He sells electronics. I was the luckiest kid to play the newest PlayStation games as they came out. That later got me to study technology and software engineering. I studied in the West Bank at the Arab American University in Jenin [https://www.aaup.edu/]. I finished my degree. I came back to Jerusalem. I wanted to work in tech, just like I’d studied. All the tech jobs are in Tel Aviv and in Haifa. Every time I get to an interview. I go there, and it’s usually a guy with a kippa sitting behind the table. I sit in front of him. He’s sweating and I’m sweating, usually. There’s some mistrust. Some fear. We don’t speak each other’s languages. We both were speaking broken English. Yeah, it was hard to land a job. Later, one day on Facebook, I saw an advertisement called Tech2Peace [https://tech2peace.com/] that brings Palestinians and Israelis to come learn tech and dialogue with each other. I was interested in tech. I needed the experience. I needed the connections and the jobs, but I was afraid of the peace. Why afraid of peace? As someone who studied in the West Bank, and lived there, and East Jerusalem… For many Palestinians, “peace” can mean accepting the status quo, which is the military occupation of the Palestinian territories. That is unacceptable. A lot of people boycott these peace-building programs for that reason. But I need to understand my neighbors. I need a job. I need to go to this program. I hide the fact from my family and friends that I was going to a peace program. I take the Egged bus, the Israeli national bus. For the first time in my life, I use that bus. I take it to Be’er Sheva, and then to Yeruham. It’s a Jewish town in the desert where the program was happening. The program was for 10 days. Every day, for three hours, we were learning something in tech. And every day, for three hours, we were engaging in dialogue. In dialogue, we were doing activities like empathetic listening, where we listen to understand and not to respond. We get to share our narratives and hear the other people’s narratives, and really understand. After 10 days, I realize it’s not just black or white. There are good people on both sides. There are afraid and angry people on both sides. And I made my first Jewish friend. I go back to Jerusalem. Visiting West Jerusalem. Going to Tel Aviv and Haifa. I feel less fear. More confidence. More understanding of the people around me. And I know better how to talk to them. Later, I joined the alumni group of Tech2Peace [https://tech2peace.com/], and they started sharing about other peace building programs. Apparently, there are 200 peace building programs [https://www.allmep.org/] under the umbrella of The Alliance for Middle East Peace. [https://www.allmep.org/] There are programs that are doing peace through art, through religion, through dance, music, sports, environment. All kinds. So, I joined 25 of these programs. [https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1nJhzZ3BBUFc_fe-9RpL6HA_cCxs32iAX168OH7WiYzY/edit?slide=id.p#slide=id.p]I did a lot of dialogue in my life. Dr. A: Wow. AJ: It was great! I really enjoyed these programs. It was a great opportunity to meet different people, and get to learn about them, and get to share with them. I know myself better through these kinds of trips. I realized that normalization…I know now how to talk about it better. We don’t want to normalize occupation, human rights abuses, violence towards the Palestinians and towards the Israelis. What we want to normalize is dialogue, understanding, working with each other because this is the way to make a better future. I realized that there are seven million Palestinians and seven million Jews between the river and the sea, and nobody is going anywhere. Especially after October 7th, we learned this lesson the hard way. Nobody is going anywhere. So, we need to build that trust together. This is how it’s going to move on. “What we want to normalize is dialogue, understanding, working with each other because this is the way to make a better future.” Blanket boycotts don’t work. If we boycott all of Israelis just because they are Israelis, it’s not helpful, it’s counterproductive. I still believe in boycott, divestment, and sanctions, Palestinians’ right for resistance in nonviolent ways. And there are things to boycott, like politicians and groups that want to nuclear attack Gaza, bomb Gaza, or want to kill Palestinians, or expel them out of their lands. That sounds horrible to me, those people need to be boycotted. Initiatives that work to build trust between Palestinians and Israelis, those are the ones that need to be supported. And we also know about some groups that hide. They bring Palestinians only to tokenize them. To support their pro-Israel, anti-Palestine, points rather than actually caring about peace building. Those need to be supervised and dealt with care. Yeah, we need to be careful of these. So I learned those lessons. Later, I became a board member at Tech2Peace. I landed a job in tech. I worked. I had a startup in tech, a journey. I found the love of my life, Michal Greenfield [https://www.michalgreenfield.com/], who’s a Jewish-American person who traveled and lived in Israel. I met her in one of the Tech2Peace [https://tech2peace.com/] seminars. I fell in love. She’s the most beautiful thing that has happened in my life. Dr. A: You guys are very cute. AJ: Thank you. Of course, there were challenges, family drama, reactions. “How are you dating a Jewish person? What will people say about us? What are your children gonna be like? Leave Her. Even if you’re okay with that, think about your brother, your sister. They are in danger because of you.” There’s a lot of responsibility. Dr. A: What kind of danger? AJ: Some people might come and burn my father’s shop — whether it’s extremist Palestinians or extremist Israelis. The Kahanist groups used to kill mixed couples and attack their houses. There are extremists that really don’t like these stories. My father was saying, “Who’s gonna marry your sister?” There’s this social pressure. My sister got married to the most handsome man and beautiful man. She has two children coming up. The man she married lives in Sheikh Jarrah [https://www.britannica.com/place/Sheikh-Jarrah], and he’s one of the four houses that were under eviction during the Sheikh Jarrah protests. Dr. A: Oh, wow. AJ: Anyway. What else? So, there’s a lot of challenges regarding partnering with a Jewish person. But later my mom got to meet Michal. She saw how humble and sweet she is. How much she loves me and how much I love her. They bonded. It takes time for these things to happen. Michal’s father supported from day one. Michal’s mother, it took her a lot of time. My father took a lot of time, until the wedding happened. When they saw that there’s a whole community that loves us and supports us. Then they started to move on. But it’s not easy. Now, why am I choosing peace as a strategy? Not only is it the only way. Like I said, there are seven million Palestinians and seven million Jews between the River Sea. Nobody’s going anywhere. We need to build trust. That’s the strongest argument, but also it’s the moral thing to do. The right thing to do. If you want peace and justice, we need to act with peace and justice. “Why am I choosing peace as a strategy? Not only is it the only way. Like I said, there are seven million Palestinians and seven million Jews between the River Sea. Nobody’s going anywhere. We need to build trust. That’s the strongest argument, but also it’s the moral thing to do. The right thing to do. If you want peace and justice, we need to act with peace and justice.” It’s the environmental effect we create around us. Violence begets violence. That’s how the world works. We are social animals, and we are affected by the environment around us. Look at children. It doesn’t matter what the points you’re trying to make for them, they don’t understand points. They just imitate what you do. It’s our natural thing. So, for these reasons, I choose to do what I’m doing. Dr. A: I love that. These things have come up, like what you’ve had to go through in your own relationship for example. Just for one. You know, in the United States, we have this history of legalization, of making it illegal to marry someone from a different culture. Racist laws preventing intermarriage were overturned around the time I was born with Loving v. Virginia [https://www.oyez.org/cases/1966/395] (1967). In my case, I fell in love with someone who was not Jewish, and who was African-descended. The U.S. is a very racialized country. So, we went through our own series of hilarious in retrospect, but very painful at the time, dramas. People somehow think that if you choose to love someone who’s not of your own culture, your whole world will somehow collapse. It’s fear. What I found is that quite the opposite happens. Now, you know your culture. You have your people, and you have to learn about someone else’s reality. So you’re actually able to learn twice as much. You’re on your way towards becoming a world citizen in a way that most people never challenge themselves to endeavor. Everything else just kind of falls away. You realize it’s all held up by things we don’t need. AJ: I like what you shared. It brought many thoughts to my head. I have three comments. The first is that interfaith marriage is illegal in Israel. I wasn’t able to marry Michal there, so I married her in the U.S. The second is, what our children are going to be like. That’s the fear my parents had. I think they will be ambassadors. Dr. A: Yes. AJ: They will learn Arabic, Hebrew, and English. They will visit the synagogue, the mosque, and the church. They will understand everybody. They’ll be friends with everybody. Haifa, the mixed city, (has a lot of interfaith) is the safest place in Israel. And the most dangerous place, the biggest strikes and war, came from the place that has the highest walls, which is Gaza. So let that sit for a second. People who have equal rights and citizenship and meet with each other and understand each other the most. Palestinians and Israelis and Jews live together in Haifa, and it’s the safest place for the Jews and for the Palestinians. While in Gaza, it’s the opposite, and the areas around Gaza. “Interfaith marriage is illegal in Israel. What are our children going to be like? I think they will be ambassadors. They will learn Arabic, Hebrew, and English. They will visit the synagogue, the mosque, and the church. They will understand everybody. They’ll be friends with everybody.” Dr. A: Yeah. I agree with you 100%. You are already an ambassador. Both of you are, really. And I’m sure that your children will be, too. From what I’ve seen in my little life, it had the reverse effect. It opened my life up and it didn’t close it off. I would never want to go back to thinking I could only exist, or be in good relationship with my ancestors, if I only was able to approach the world as if everything had to be in one particular way. AJ: Hmm. Dr. A: I think it helped me fall in love with culture and faith, and be curious, and make friends. In your own time, I hope that’s what you experience too. This kind of openness where you get to speak from your deep knowledge, from your whole life, and also be heard everywhere, and make friends everywhere, and feel safe everywhere. AJ: Thank you, I hope so. We’re working on it. Dr. A: You’re doing a great job. AJ: Yeah. Dr. A: Alright. Well, are there any last things you would like to share before we sign off? AJ: I want to thank you for sharing your stories also, and your parents and grandparents, and reflecting on what I’ve shared with you too. Thank you for your curiosity. You always try to support me and say good things about me. I really appreciate you. People like you are the ones who give me this confidence and give me this sense of safety to speak up more. Dr. A: I’ve watched you, and you’re doing such a fantastic job. I really feel you as an aspirational soul. I’m so glad that our paths crossed. And I desire all the very best for you. I just have total trust in you, and I want everyone to get behind you, because I’ve watched the way you move in different kinds of settings. I think you come from real deep experience and knowledge. And yet, you’re not letting the way things are limit your imagination. AJ: Thank you. I wanted to add to one of your questions about inheritance of peace. Why am I choosing to go that path, too? It’s also the safest path. It’s one of the most dangerous paths to take, because I’m attacked by everybody — the extremists on both sides, and all of that. And for me, it’s also the safest. Because if I choose any of the other paths I’ll be dead. I’ll be in jail. I’ll be somewhere else, because it’s not working, especially in Jerusalem. I think you understand my point. Dr. A: I do. It’s interesting, because my mother was born in Jerusalem in 1932. She was born a Jewish person. She did not have a passport, but, at the time, it would have been issued by the British Mandate Palestine. She raised me, talking to me about her childhood playing with Jewish and Arab children when she was little. She loved that. She raised me in this whole other reality of storytelling. In her particular experience, it’s so different from what has happened. AJ: Yeah. Every time you share, you bring the thoughts back to me. Yeah, I shared what I shared just earlier with you to say that building relationships with people like you, you are now my community, my extended family. Dr. A: Àṣẹ. AJ: This has become my survival instinct. It’s a natural outcome for me, as a Jerusalemite, to survive in the circumstances I lived in. I’m thankful that this has become my way. I think I’m lucky, because a lot of people, unfortunately, tend to go to other paths for their own sake. But I’m grateful that this has been the choice for me. Dr. A: Yeah. I agree. I think it’s the only path. For me, I also think it’s the only path. Everyone who comes on this podcast has chosen that path. And, yeah, if we limit our imaginations to the point of thinking that something that doesn’t work is the only way, we’re basically passing that down to the next generation as an unlivable condition of life. So I think the only choice is to choose the better option even if it doesn’t feel within reach. I’m twice your age and I’ve seen some things change. Not everything changes, not everything sticks. But my hope is that we see more and more change, and it wouldn’t happen if we don’t lean into what might appear impossible, which could become possible. AJ: Yeah, very well said. I would like to add that, Yes, if I’m choosing the path of peace, reconciliation, forgiveness. I do all of these things, but I don’t forget. We also need to learn from the lessons of the past. We need to acknowledge the reality. The power imbalance and to work to achieve a higher level of equality and safety for all. “I’m choosing the path of peace, reconciliation, forgiveness. I do all of these things, but I don’t forget. We also need to learn from the lessons of the past. We need to acknowledge the reality. The power imbalance and to work to achieve a higher level of equality and safety for all.” Dr. A: Absolutely. Well, I just want to honor all that you’re holding and carrying, and the fact that even just to be able to say, I can communicate in different languages and I will let each conversation inform me. Most people haven’t done that. So, you are our ambassador, my dear. You already are. Ambassador of the Future. Adnan Jaber: Inshallah. I hope it’ll be a good one. Dr. A: Yeah. Adnan Jaber: Thank you, Amy. Dr. A: Thank you, Adnan. AJ: I think the person who I am today has to do a lot with my mother and her kindness, and her love of socializing with people and getting to know them. And the other reason is the community that I’ve been surrounded by. People like you, like I mentioned. I wanted to share this point now. October 7th has deepened the trauma on both sides. A lot of people have lost trust on the other side. I just wanted to say that a moment of breakdown is a moment of breakthrough. In the midst of this devastation that we have seen in the aftermath of October 7th, the Its Time Coalition [https://www.timeisnow.co.il/english] has emerged. The biggest Arab / Jewish, Palestinian / Israeli bilateral summit has emerged. 7,000 people gathered in Tel Aviv and 5,000 people gathered the year after in Jerusalem. That was the biggest gathering ever in the history of Israel and Palestine, and that happened after October 7th. So, there is momentum here today. We need to catch it, support it, and go with it. It’s Time Coalition, I encourage people to look at it. Resources The Skin Deep [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJCYGGHwooY] {The AND} Peace Tech Forum [https://www.allmep.org/allmep-resources/peacetech-forum-vision-becoming-a-reality-marking-new-chapter-in-collaboration-for-the-field/] Adnan’s Journey with Tech2Peace [https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1nJhzZ3BBUFc_fe-9RpL6HA_cCxs32iAX168OH7WiYzY/edit?slide=id.p#slide=id.p] “Can Innovation Unify Across Divides?: Three Israeli-Palestinian Initiatives Show Peace Is Possible,” Forbes [https://www.forbes.com/sites/hessiejones/2024/12/24/can-innovation-unify-across-divides-three-israeli-palestinian-initiatives-say-peace-is-possible/] “Life+ Meets: Muhammad, Rajai, and Adnan, founders of Yalla Reyada” [https://medium.com/life-collective/life-meets-muhammad-rajai-and-adnan-founders-of-yalla-reyada-955a914d3c7d] “The Voice Behind the Machine: A Palestinian’s AI Solution to a Long-Standing Dispute” [https://www.radical-pragmatist.com/p/the-voice-behind-the-machine-a-palestinians?r=44e7j1&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true] Arab American University [https://www.aaup.edu/] Alliance for Middle East Peace [https://www.allmep.org/] Its Time Coalition [https://www.allmep.org/allmep-resources/jerusalem-peoples-peace-summit-its-time-brings-together-5000-participants-in-call-to-end-war-embrace-peacebuilding/] Biographies Adnan Jaber [https://www.weforum.org/people/adnan-jaber/] is a curious, hopeful human from Jerusalem, now living in Los Angeles. On a mission to bring people together through tech, AI, dialogue, and entrepreneurship. As a lecturer at UCLA, Adnan teaches “Design Entrepreneurship for Peace and Impact,” empowering students to harness technology for social good. He has been part of the executive board at Tech2Peace for six years, contributing to the collaborative team efforts that transformed the organization from its early stages with very limited funding into a multimillion-dollar initiative that fosters tech and dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians. Adnan founded the PeaceTech Affinity Group with ALLMEP, uniting 20 CEOs focused on peacebuilding by engaging Palestinians and Israelis through tech education, entrepreneurship, job placement, and dialogue within a shared high-tech ecosystem. Adnan is currently a Member at OpenAI Forum, and Member at Council on Tech and Social Cohesion. Ex-director and host at Beitna channel that makes stories about wonderful Palestinians and Israelis showing the humanity on each side. A fellow at the Beerman Foundation and an awardee of Billions Acts of Peace, Adnan recently presented the Youth AI Policy at the Global Nobel Peace Summit, emphasizing the urgent need for AI training and AI ethics, continuing his journey to unite communities through technology.. Dr. Amy Shimshon-Santo [http://www.amyshimshon.com] is a writer, editor, and educator who believes that creativity is a powerful tool for personal and social transformation. This interview has been slightly edited and condensed for clarity. Subscribe to Inheritance of Peace with Amy Shimshon-Santo on Apple Podcasts [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-interview/id1624946521] or on substack at Warm Blooded Mammal With Hair. [https://amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/?utm_campaign=profile_chips] Theme music for this program is by Avila Santo. [http://www.avila.santo.com/] This series highlights everyday people from across the generations and various walks of life —poets, researchers, shepherds, healers — who discuss our Inheritance of Peace as foundational for a just society. Get full access to Warm Blooded Mammal With Hair at amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/subscribe [https://amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Pranidhi Varshney

Service as a Peace Practice Amy Shimshon-Santo (AS²): This is Inheritance of Peace and I’m Amy Shimshon-Santo. In this episode, we enjoy a conversation with Pranidhi Varshney. She is a mother of three, and the founder of Yoga Shala West [https://www.yogashalawest.com/], an accessible Ashtanga Yoga space, where people seek balance through the daily practice of “skill in action.” Having immigrated to the midwestern U.S. as a child from India, she’s become an expert at swimming between the poles of here and there, motherhood and community life, personal awareness and being a part of positive change. Her Inheritance of Peace draws from yoga philosophy, Gandhian principles, and the example set by her parents. How can we cultivate joy in our relationships while being of service? How can even our strongest actions be guided by love? AS²: We’ll just hop right in. The first question is, who are you? Pranidhi Varshney (PV): Who am I? The ultimate question. AS²: Exactly. PV: My name is Pranidhi Varshney. I live here in Los Angeles and hail from India, originally. I was born there, and moved to the states when I was about six. I made my way to California, and I love it here. AS²: Right on. You knew how to drop in. PV: Who am I? Yeah. That’s who I am. It’s interesting. In our culture, in the Indian culture, we rarely define ourselves by who we are in a solo context. Even what we call each other is always relational. Except for my children, I call them by their names. I usually just call them by their pet names, or sweetheart or something. But when you’re a child in my culture, you’re always referring to everybody by their titles, not by their names. “In our culture, the Indian culture, we rarely define ourselves by who we are in a solo context. Even what we call each other is always relational. Along with the relational aspect, respect is a really big part of Indian culture. Respect for the elder. Everybody elder to you has a title, including siblings. We use those words auntie and uncle to refer to anyone outside your actual family who is older to you. My parents’ friends, I call them all aunties and uncles. In that way, the sense of community continues to broaden.” AS²: What are examples of that? PV: My sister’s name is Navya, but my children do not call her Navya, or even Auntie Navya. They call her Mausi which means mom’s sister. AS²: Oh! PV: We have names for our mom’s brother. I don’t have any brothers, but even my cousins would be referred to as my brothers, so they would call them a certain name. And then from my husband’s family, there’s a certain title for each person. So that’s how my culture, as Indian culture, is. It’s very, very relational. AS²: Wow, I love to hear what the actual titles are. Sometimes the titles let us know. Not all family relationships in every culture are not always named. What are some of the other titles? PV: Well, that’s interesting, because I’m thinking now in Indian culture, there’s never a title for any child. Along with the relational aspect, respect is a really big part of Indian culture. Respect for the elder. Everybody elder to you has a title, including siblings. I have three children. My older daughter, middle son, and then my youngest daughter, who’s just turned one. She doesn’t speak yet, but my middle son obviously speaks. He’s almost five, and he calls my older daughter, not by her name usually, but by the honorific, which is Didi, which means older sister. Anyone older to you generally has a title, and anyone younger to you generally does not. AS²: You’re a student. You’re learning. Oh, I love that. One of the ways that language is so important is it weaves us together in social relations. You can’t just translate everything. I have friends who have said, if you lose a language you lose the social relations because you don’t have a name for it. It’s not just auntie or uncle. It’s very specific relationships that matter. PV: In our culture, something else is cool too. You said auntie and uncle, so it’s reminding me that auntie and uncle, we use those words quite often, but they are used to refer to anyone outside your actual family who is older to you. My parents’ friends, I called them all aunties and uncles. In that way, the sense of community continues to broaden. AS²: Yes. PV: My children call my sister Mausi, I call my mom’s sisters Mausies. AS²: Nice. Oh, I love it. Beautiful, beautiful. PV: It is funny that when you asked me who I was, I was so American about it. This is my name. This is where I live. This is where I’m from. AS²: That’s the way it is. PV: But this is constantly how I feel. It’s sort of balancing between these two poles. Since being a child, and an immigrant child, that’s kind of just how we swim. Between these two poles. AS²: That’s how we swim. That is exactly how we swim, and it’s a real benefit. It’s a tremendous benefit. Because in every language and every culture comes all this knowledge and a worldview. And if you can see things from more than one perspective. you have twice as much to pull from, or three times as much, or more. So I’m a real fan of that. But we learn in school, and we learn in society, to edit that part out and leave it at home. Even though it’s so valuable. PV: Do you think it’s still that way? AS²: Do you? PV: Well, the reason I ask is I noticed that in my children’s education, they’re so encouraged to bring their cultures. There’s really a sense that we’re all part of something here and we’re all bringing our unique perspectives. There’s a real sense of belonging. I know that not all schools have that, but I feel blessed that we do. I see such a big change, even from when I was growing up. So I was curious. AS²: I love that you defended that thought. For me and for my grown children, it was definitely not like that. It felt like an aspirational idea. Something you had to create. Oftentimes we would go do the cultural events at school so that the teachers or administration knew where to begin, and then welcome other people into that process. But it was kind of a homemade feeling of trying to bring the home culture into the school space. So I’m really glad that it doesn’t feel quite as divergent for your kids. Because you want to be whole. PV: Yeah. Of course. AS²: That’s good news. What do you get to do with your life force? Sometimes this changes over time. PV: I get to do lots of things. I get to do the laundry, I’m sitting here in my laundry room, so that’s what I’m thinking about. I haven’t pulled those clothes yet. I get to do a lot of laundry folding. I get to do a lot of cooking. I have three children. AS²: That sounds to me like a Buddhist response. PV: But I also get to teach yoga and hold space. I get to be a wife. I get to go swimming sometimes, ride my bike sometimes, while I listen to music (riding) down the LA River. I feel like I have a pretty great life. When I remember that I do. I think that’s the challenge. It’s easy to drop into places of negativity. But when someone is posing me the gift of a question like “what do I get to do with my life?” I really think about it. Wow, I get to do pretty cool stuff. AS²: Did you choose what you’re doing, what you get to do with your life? Parenting and running a yoga shala. Mentoring people. Creating your family. Being a partner. PV: Part of me wants to say, yes, I consciously chose all these things. But I don’t know if I believe that we have as much agency as we think over the way in which we point our rudders. How we direct ourselves. I think our agency is more in how we are wherever we find ourselves. The way in which we carry ourselves. The way we respond to the stimuli that are given to us. I think real wisdom is knowing that. I’m not coming from a high and mighty place. It’s been energy trying to direct the course of my life. But I think the times that I’m most fulfilled, most at peace, happiest, when I can really love where I am. And whatever challenges I find myself in, change how I’m showing up in those challenges. It’s not like we don’t have to make choices in our lives. We have to choose. Am I gonna go this way or that way? But, when I was younger, I think there was a lot more will involved. Like through force of will, where am I gonna steer the ship? “I think our agency is more in how we are wherever we find ourselves. The way in which we carry ourselves. The way we respond to the stimuli that are given to us. I think real wisdom is knowing that. As I’ve gotten older, I am trying to find the stream a bit more and follow that. Where am I needed? Where can I be of service? Where do the skills that I have align with what the world needs? As I’ve gotten older, I am trying to find the stream a bit more and follow that. Where am I needed? Where can I be of service? Where do the skills that I have align with what the world needs, and how can I follow that? AS²: My momentum is associated with everything around me that I’m a part of. PV: Yeah. It’s taken me some time to get there. I was a very rebellious teenager in some ways. I was like, I’m gonna break out of this container that I feel like I’ve been placed in. I broke out of it, but then one has to deal with the consequences of that. It took me a while to deal with the consequences of those decisions that I made. There were times when I felt unhappy with where I ended up. But, I look around and there’s so much beauty. There’s so much beauty, and there’s so much joy. I have these three beautiful children. Now that I’m thinking about it, decision-making in my life is less about spreadsheets and charts and things like that, and more of an inner sense of knowing. That’s been a very constant thing, and not everybody makes decisions that way. My husband certainly doesn’t, but I feel like that’s how I make decisions, big decisions, in my life. It’s through this really strong feeling that just comes up. All of a sudden my life is moving in a certain way. When that feeling comes up, I do have a strong will that helps me get over the finish line. “Decision-making in my life is less about spreadsheets and charts and things like that, and more of an inner sense of knowing. It’s through this really strong feeling that just comes up. All of a sudden my life is moving in a certain way. When that feeling comes up, I do have a strong will that helps me get over the finish line.” AS²: I’m a fan of strong will when you feel clear. You opened up as a child of immigrants. Family has been important to me. This is how family is related to community. I’m a part of running a household and mothering and parenting. You’re a yoga mentor, and you guide your own space, and you do it in a way that’s really different than probably some listeners might imagine a yoga space to be. I’m curious if there’s anything you want to say about when you said you were a rebel. How did the rebel wind up in this extreme contemplative practice of Ashtanga yoga? PV: The decade in which I grew up, which is the 90s, we grew up with a sense that we could do anything, especially as women. We were gonna be girl bosses, and we could do anything. We were very ambitious. And in Indian culture, also, there’s a lot of ambition. There’s a lot of ambition in striving and wanting to excel at whatever we’re doing. When I was growing up, that was mostly showing up in an academic setting. When I was growing up at home. I just decided I didn’t really want to do that, and so I went into the arts. I went in a different direction. But there was still a part of me that was ambitious, and that wanted to achieve. As I was going through college, my career was sort of diffuse as an artist. You know. Yoga came along and I was really lucky to find Ashtanga yoga pretty quickly when I started practicing. There was such a clarity to it. There’s a clarity, and a direction, and not having to think too much about which way you’re going and what you’re gonna do, but you just show up on the mat, and you do that. And there’s just this forward momentum. And as we practice longer, we realize it’s not all about going forward. But at the beginning, that was really helpful to me. The clarity. The discipline that I could channel on the mat. That’s how I found my way to the practice. But interestingly, in the course of that I became changed by it. If you’re doing it right, the practice will change you. Refine you. I had to get clear about what I was doing with my life. Certain things started to feel out of alignment, and actually my whole career in the arts started to feel out of alignment. I turned to the thing where I felt aligned and that was the yoga mat. That was wanting to create a space for people where they could also feel that sense of alignment. What I mean is not physical alignment, but balance. AS²: Yeah. So, in your artistic career, were you singing? PV: I was singing. I was acting. I was going wherever the work was. That’s what you have to do as an artist. That career and lifestyle change brought me here to California. I grew up in Michigan, after moving from India, and spent some time in Chicago. Then I came here to California. It was here that I really started delving deeper into the yoga practice, and where I started to feel that if I’m really going to give my all to something I need to give my all to that thing. Rather than feeling beholden to different directions. AS²: I wanted to ask one little question about your vision of the space that you create as a yoga teacher and mentor. It feels really different than any other yoga space I’ve ever been in. And I wonder if that came from something you witnessed in your life somewhere else, or if you just made that up? PV: Oh, no, no. I didn’t make it up. I feel like we don’t really make up much. Everything is an inheritance. I had a sense, having spent many years in this city, I felt like people were just getting priced out of the practice. To put it simply. I just felt like monthly fees were, for some people, completely out of reach. People who want to have a dedicated practice just couldn’t do it. Or they had to do with the shame of going to the teacher, and can I get a discount, or whatever it is, you know? That feels icky. I thought, well, if I’m gonna start something, then let me see how I can make it accessible. We developed this sliding scale, or flexible contribution model. An organization called Service Space [https://nipun.servicespace.org/] was pretty instrumental in helping me develop it. Nipun Mehta [https://nipun.servicespace.org/about/] is the leader of this organization. My husband met him through meditation practice. I got to meet him, and learn about his work. He’s traveled the world. He basically espouses Gandhian principles. [https://www.mkgandhi.org/g_relevance/chap26.php] It makes sense that we’re talking about this since this podcast is called Inheritance of Peace. That was Gandhi’s whole thing. Nonviolence and living a life of service. This organization inspires people to live lives of service. I did a little incubator with them, and they helped me. That was right around when I was designing the model of the shala [https://www.yogashalawest.com/](śālā, Skt: शाला). Outside of even helping me design the nuts and bolts, just having that framework of, okay, there are people designing organizations like this. There are people trying to do things outside of a transactional quality. That’s what you feel. At the Shala, we gotta pay our rent. I’m keeping track of students’ fees and all that. But, from a broader sense, it’s an understanding that this is not a transactional relationship. We’re gonna try to operate outside those parameters. AS²: Beautiful. PV: Being from India, I don’t have rose-colored glasses on when I talk about India. It’s a real place, just like any other real place. I imagine back in the day when yoga was being taught in caves, it was not transactional. But now? Even if you look at our specific lineage, it costs money. I think that this transactional quality is perhaps more of a Western thing, but I think it’s the commodification that’s more of a Western thing. It’s not that money wasn’t always a part of it. What I saw when I was practicing in LA is there’s a yoga space, but then there’s the boutique outside that’s selling $500 clothes. That just feels so unnecessary. I didn’t want to have anything to do with that particular aspect of it. AS²: That’s amazing. So you mentioned Michigan, Los Angeles, California, India. My next question is, what lands are you connected to? PV: I think those. Those are the lands that I feel connected to. Each one has its own quality. I think each one has shaped who I am in its own specific way. I also feel really connected to the ocean. I love the water. AS²: I’m curious about weather and food in these places. PV: Oh, yeah. Food is a big one. We love food in India and that’s the best part about going to India. The food is amazing. I’m really fortunate that my mom is such a wonderful cook. She brought all that when we were young. I’m doing my best to pass it on. I spend a lot of my time in the kitchen. I’m doing my best to pass it on to my kids. It’s also amazing living here in California. One of our weekly rituals is to go to our local farmer’s market every single Sunday. It’s such a gift to live in a place where there’s this abundance, fresh abundance that we can turn into sustenance. I love it. My kids also love it. It is kind of like going to church for us. We go every week, and we get to see the seasons change in that way. We had our first taste of cherries last week so now we’re like, okay, it’s the start of stone fruit season! These little things help cultivate joy in our kids’ lives. This understanding of the cycle of life. That things change, things come back around. Things change, things come back around. “One of our weekly rituals is to go to our local farmer’s market. I love it. My kids also love it. We get to see the seasons change in that way. These little things help cultivate joy in our kids’ lives. This understanding of the cycle of life. That things change, things come back around.” AS²: Beautiful. Love that. Okay, so let’s turn to the big question of the day. And, this can be very personal, it could also be ancestral a bit, because all of us are coming from something. What would you say is your Inheritance of Peace? PV: I love that question. Ever since you mentioned the name of this podcast I’ve been thinking, what a cool question. Cool inquiry. And the first place my mind went as I was just mulling things over was, of course, the Gandhian principles. The nonviolence that Gandhi changed the country with. I’m thinking about yoga philosophy. In yoga philosophy there can be a sense, maybe from the outside looking in, that it’s a pacifist philosophy. It’s about doing nothing or doing less. That’s not it. My understanding is that it’s skill in action. How can we be skillful in every single action that we take? Oftentimes, we do have to take strong action. But how can we take strong action with love? “In yoga philosophy there can be a sense, from the outside looking in, that it’s a pacifist philosophy. It’s about doing nothing or doing less. That’s not it. My understanding is that it’s skill in action. How can we be skillful in every single action that we take? Oftentimes, we do have to take strong action. But how can we take strong action with love?” I think about that with my kids, too. Being a good parent is not just letting your kids walk off the edge of a cliff. You gotta hold the line sometimes, but you gotta do it with love. Inheritance from my country, from this yoga philosophy. But on a more intimate level, my inheritance of peace comes from my parents. My mother, when we were growing up. My sister and I would go do these service projects here and volunteer there. We were teenagers. We would sometimes act, to be honest, real shitty at home. We’d be “doing good” out in the world, but then come home and just blah. She said to us, what’s up with that, basically? I don’t remember exact words, but basically, what’s up with that? There are plenty of opportunities to serve here in our home. That has always stuck with me. I think it’s so true. We, especially now, in a day and age where we can be connected to everything that’s happening in any extremity of the world. I have to constantly remind myself. How can I serve at home? How can I serve in my household, in my community, in the relationships that I have access to? The reason I think that that is my inheritance of peace is that that is how we spread peace. How we are. Who we are. How we behave. How we move through our daily lives. To me, that’s how we make a change. Those ripples. “I have to constantly remind myself, how can I serve at home? How can I serve in my household, in my community, in the relationships that I have access to? I think that is my inheritance of peace. That is how we spread peace. How we are. Who we are. How we behave. How we move through our daily lives. That’s how we make a change. Those ripples.” I talked about my mom, but my dad is the perfect embodiment of that. While I was growing up, he spent almost all of his time taking care of us. My mom did, too. But, people don’t always expect that of fathers. He really did. They both worked full-time. They provided for our family financially. Outside of that time, they were just there for us. I think even on a subconscious level. That level of caretaking, I internalized it. That’s probably why I find myself in caretaking roles now. I feel that’s my inheritance. AS²: It’s really powerful to hear this connection you’re expressing between caretaking and service. Because somehow in the home, we’re expected to have family values, but what happens in the home isn’t really supported socially with our institutions. It’s kind of luck, to a certain extent, what you fall into. All the things one might need for sustenance at home, a lot of those things are being cut right now. It’s beautiful for me to be reminded today of your mother’s lesson. That’s a form of service, everything you do. You’re raising the next generation. You’re affecting the energy and experience of your family members, your neighbors, and the people who are known to you. There’s no kind of change that will happen unless we also are being attentive there. That’s really powerful. PV: Yeah. It can also inform the work we do out in the world. Not that there’s always a binary, but we do tend to think of our home lives and the work we do outside of home. I also experience that binary. I often think, how do I want my kids growing up? How do I want them to be in the world? That helps inform what I do, and what I engage with. I’m very careful with my attention and where I put it. I find if I put my attention too far outside, I tend to feel frayed. Part of what the yoga practice has given me is an ability to tap into how things are affecting me. The quality of awareness. I need to be careful with where my attention is going. If I can find ways to serve that are really impactful, that are really affectual, then do those things. There’s a more balanced way in which to approach these things. It comes from a sense of inner balance. “We tend to think of our home lives and the work we do outside of home. I also experience that binary. I often think, how do I want my kids growing up? How do I want them to be in the world? That helps inform what I do and what I engage with. I’m careful with my attention and where I put it. The yoga practice has given me an ability to tap into how things are affecting me. The quality of awareness.” AS: Inner balance. Which is the thing nobody has. And I don’t mean nobody. That’s definitely what I feel in your space, and the practice asks of us. It’s so fascinating to say, I will change myself. I will change how I’m showing up. That is part of the change of any other larger change or different kinds of changes I wish. And, without that, it probably won’t happen. PV: I don’t think that peace can be achieved through hate. I just don’t believe that. In my husband’s culture, in Sikh culture, there’s this concept of the saint-soldier. Sometimes you have to cut something down, but you cannot do it from hate. You have to do it from love. Not cruelty. Cruelty cannot be the way. We have to sometimes hold the line for what is right and good. But rarely does that happen when we ourselves are mired in misery. Sometimes, these days, I feel like we take on misery as a virtue. Instead, we might allow our awareness of everything that’s going on in the world to actually do the opposite and fill us with gratitude. Fill us with gratitude for what we do have, and the wonderful blessings that we might have around us. Then use that sense of gratitude to make some kind of change. War has been a part of our history since we began… “Peace can not be achieved through hate. Sometimes you have to cut something down, but you cannot do it from hate. You have to do it from love. Not cruelty. Cruelty cannot be the way.” AS²: So, the Bhagavad Gita, does touch on this stuff. Somehow in facing difficult things, if I’m not mistaken, it’s supposed to help us become who we are. PV: It’s forging the sword. The Gita does have this violent context. It’s a story about staying true to one’s purpose within this context of difficulty and challenge and questioning. Question: Am I doing the right thing? Am I on the right path? Having that unwavering resolve. I should say, not having it, finding it. Finding that unwavering resolve. Which some people might call faith. “The Bhagavad Gita does have this violent context. It’s a story about staying true to one’s purpose within this context of difficulty and challenge and questioning. Question: Am I doing the right thing? Am I on the right path? Having that unwavering resolve. I should say, not having it, finding it. Finding that unwavering resolve. Which some people might call faith.” AS²: I’m always saying to parents, replace your worry with faith. It’s more useful. It’s a more useful energy. Not naivete, but devotional faith. Not everyone has studied yoga philosophy or Gandhian principles. I just wondered if there’s anything in particular in yogic philosophy, when it comes to thinking in a deep way, in an empowering way about peace. In a strong way about peace as a powerful force. PV: We were talking about the Gita. I think the Gita is the ultimate text. In the context of this battle one finds this sense of faith. But that’s just one yogic text. There are a lot. We can talk about the Yoga Sutras also (Patañjali yogasūtram, पतञ्जलि योगसूत्रम्). They are more practice-oriented. For people who are wanting a sense of, how can I do this practice? Or what are the philosophical underpinnings of this practice? There’s a lot there in the Yoga Sutras. We’re talking about all these principles. The yamas and niyamas. This is exactly what we’ve been talking about this whole time. How do you show up with yourself? How do you show up with your relationships? Simplicity. Humility. Putting the ego aside. Not grasping unnecessarily. All these concepts are there in what we call Ashtanga Yoga, the 8-limbed path. It’s a contemplative path. It takes on many forms. But it’s also not unique to yoga philosophy. These are the teachings of any faith system that we’ve cultivated as humans. Each one has its own shimmer to it. But we’re all trying to do the same stuff. We’re all trying to figure out, how do we move through this life in a meaningful way? AS²: And somehow leave it a little bit better, if possible. PV: Exactly. AS²: In your space, you have the big beautiful red image of the different limbs [https://www.yogashalawest.com/eight-limbs-graphic] with the yamas and the yamas on the bottom. I always think, do do this and don’t do that. You can get yourself in a lot of trouble. It’s very hard to undo a lot of bad doing. PV: That’s right. AS²: In addition to doing the good things, you want to limit the things that are gonna make your life more of a mess. PV: Yep. AS²: A lot of them are very social. Don’t harm someone. PV: Yeah, exactly. AS²: Tell the truth, and don’t harm someone. PV: Yeah. AS²: Even the threads to principles of the MeToo Movement, even those kinds of guides are in these old principles. I guess human beings have been “being human” for a long time. PV: Yeah. It’s helpful to have these guidelines. It’s helpful to have a sense of structure around our behavior. And as we get more steeped, and more wise, we understand that there’s a lot of nuance there also. AS²: In the to-dos. Don’t lose your momentum. Keep that fire going. Stick with the divine. It’s just very fascinating. The way you have them laid out, they’re on either side so it’s almost like your left arm and your right arm. PV: They have to work in conjunction. AS²: I’m so glad that you’ve made time to step away and reflect a little bit about this. I’m always learning something new, and I love the whole conversation from how we call ourselves, how we name family relations and community relations. This is an old heritage. What you’re building on in your choice to focus on yoga as part of your service didn’t start recently. This is a lot older than the United States. PV: Yeah. AS²: How old do you think this tie goes back in terms of a base? PV: We can go really far back, because ultimately, this is a breath practice. As humans, how we know a baby is okay is they cry. They cry because it’s the first breath that they ever take. Breath is foundational to our human experience. On the yoga mat, we’re harnessing our breath. Sure, we’re putting our body into these different shapes and stuff. But really, we’re harnessing our breath. Harnessing the breath started, who knows when. These practices probably go back beyond our conceptual understanding. AS²: Of humankind. PV: In a way, that ancestry belongs to all of us. It doesn’t just belong to me, because I grew up in India. No, I think it belongs to all of us. AS²: All of us homo sapiens, doing the breathing thing. And all the other animals who are breathers. PV: We do have this unique ability to direct our breath. We have a conscious agency over our breath. It feels like something uniquely powerful. AS²: Yeah. Thank you so much for being a part of this big web of peacemaking that’s also claiming the ground of heritage. We have something to pull from to try to make our lives better, and to intentionally do the best that we can in a fulfilling way with our life force. Is there any last little thing you might like to share before we wrap up? PV: Hmm. Maybe I should do a little chant? AS²: Yes. PV: Ohm. [Pranidhi chants a yoga mantra.] This mantra is about cultivating a sense of fullness and wholeness. And of course, we always end with Om Shanti, Shanti, Shanti which is Peace, Peace, Peace. ॐ पूर्णमदः पूर्णमिदं पूर्णात्पुर्णमुदच्यते । पूर्णस्य पूर्णमादाय पूर्णमेवावशिष्यते ॥ ॐ शान्तिः शान्तिः शान्तिः ॥ Om Puurnham-Adah Puurnham-Idham Puurnnhaat-Purnham-Udachyate Puurnnasya Puurnham-Aadaaya Puurnnameva-Avashissyate Om Shaantih Shaantih Shaantih, Hari Om. That is whole (Infinite), This is whole (Finite). From that wholeness, this wholeness comes forth. If you take away the whole from the whole. The whole remains. Om Shanti Shanti Shanti: Om Peace, Peace. Pranidhi Varshney: Pranidhi is the founder of this little shala that could. The teacher who has had the most impact on her is Manju Jois [https://manjupjois.com/]. She has also studied with Nancy Gilgoff [https://www.ashtangayogacentre.com.au/about-nancy-gilgoff/], Sharath Jois [https://sharathyogacentre.com/sharath-jois/], and several other teachers within the ashtanga yoga lineage. Her children, courageous and wise little beings, teach her most of all. The thread that runs through all her work is the desire to nurture community, authenticity, and balance. * Pranidhi’s YouTube Channel [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClmz0g6NCFXKjiQJLTBIiPw] * Pranidhana Album [https://open.spotify.com/album/61aseT9LTU0iVS7WP63VkT]on Spotify * Pranidhi’s Writing [https://www.yogashalawest.com/writing] * Eight Limbs Graphic [https://www.yogashalawest.com/eight-limbs-graphic] Yoga Shala West [https://www.yogashalawest.com/#teachers] is an autonomous and interdependent community of ashtanga yoga practitioners in the heart of West Los Angeles. Additional Resources: Service Space [https://www.servicespace.org/] is a volunteer-run ecosystem incubating compassionate action. For 26 years, our small, collective acts are powered by a simple idea: when we change ourselves through service, we change the world. Eknath Easwaran, Classics of Hindu Classics of Indian Spirituality: Includes: The Bhagavad Gita, The Dhammapada, and The Upanishad [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/506908.Classics_of_Indian_Spirituality_3_Volume_Boxed_Set]. [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/506908.Classics_of_Indian_Spirituality_3_Volume_Boxed_Set] This interview has been edited and condensed. Subscribe to Inheritance of Peace with Amy Shimshon-Santo on Apple Podcasts [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-interview/id1624946521] or on substack at Warm Blooded Mammal With Hair. [https://amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/?utm_campaign=profile_chips]Theme music for this program is by Avila Santo. [http://www.avila.santo.com/] This series highlights everyday people from across the generations and various walks of life —poets, researchers, shepherds, healers — who discuss our Inheritance of Peace as foundational for a just society. This is a reader-supported publication. Become a free or paid subscriber to receive new posts and support our work. If you enjoy this offering, tell your friends and consider making a charitable donation to CREO Changemakers, info@creochangemakers.com. Get full access to Warm Blooded Mammal With Hair at amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/subscribe [https://amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Leonora Simonovis

APPRECIATION & MUTUAL RESPECT Amy Shimshon-Santo (AS²): This is Inheritance of Peace. I’m Amy Shimshon-Santo. In this episode, we speak with Leonora Simonovis — poet, editor, professor, and mother. Simonovis traces her Inheritance of Peace to early life lessons of ingenuity and gratitude that she learned during her childhood in Venezuela. Her stories reveal deep empathy for human and more than human life. She highlights the importance of “relationality” between people (and our many cultures) along with plants, animals, and the land. Simonovis advocates for rejecting greed and cultivating mutual respect as the foundation for working toward peace. Thanks for tuning in. Leonora Simonovis (LS): I am a human. A wild little animal. I am a mother of two. I am a poet, a writer, a teaching artist. A wanderer. A seeker. Someone who cares very much about the land. I’m just happy to be alive, in these crazy times. And to go through it with some awareness, and to learn as I move along the way. AS²: Oh, yes. I want to make a t-shirt now that says, “I am a wild little animal.” LS: Please do. I’ll buy it. AS²: Thank you for that poetic entrance. LS: I think my life purpose is to live my life in the best way that I can. That is a process, because it changes, and it shifts. Sometimes I think that I am where I need to be, and sometimes I think that I need to shake things a little bit so that I can move and transform whatever has become stale. Part of it is education. I find that being in the classroom and having difficult conversations does help me understand why things are the way they are. And what my role could be. AS²: Do you want to give an example of a difficult question that you might pose? LS: Yeah. So this semester, we are reading a novel by a Native American writer Darcie Little Badger [https://darcielittlebadger.com/]. Elasoe [https://birchbarkbooks.com/products/elatsoe] is the name of the novel. It’s a beautiful YA (Young Adult Fiction) novel about a 17-year-old young woman who has powers. She’s aware of the responsibility that having those powers means. There are a lot of questions about: Okay, if we have the power to do something, how do we do it? If we had all of that power, would we attack? Would we create war? Or would we instead try to negotiate, have conversations and dialogue? We got to talk about all of these things. One of the students said, “I can’t believe how similar this is to our reality.” And that was the point of reading the novel. How can I create connection and build community? But, also, a community that can think critically and compassionately about others and what is going on in the world. Would you stand up for someone else? Or would you just let it play out because it doesn’t “affect you.” The book helped us have some deep discussions about relationality in today’s world, and history, and how we fit into all of that. “I became aware of the fact that home is wherever I am. Of the land as a sentient being, as a mother, as a caring figure.” AS²: I’m going to turn us toward the next question. What are the lands that you feel connected to and why? LS: Such a good question, thank you, I appreciate that. I would say I still feel very connected to Kumeyaay [https://www.kumeyaay.com/]land in San Diego, in Southern California. It’s the first place where I became aware of the fact that home is wherever I am. Of the land as a sentient being, as a mother, as a caring figure. But I also learned about the indigenous lands in my home country, which is something that I wasn’t as conscious about. I mean, I had read a little about it. My mother, when I was very small, bought me a lot of stories by indigenous people from Venezuela, from different parts of the country (books) that had been translated by missionaries. One of those is my very favorite story. I still have it. It’s all scuffed up. It’s called El Tigre y El Rayo [https://search.worldcat.org/es/title/El-tigre-y-el-rayo-:-cuento-de-la-tribu-pemon/oclc/8085373] translated by Cesáreo de Armellada. AS²: El Tigre y El Rayo. LS: I actually studied Warao, [http://www.caribbeanlanguages.org.jm/node/194] which is an indigenous language. Living in California, I became aware of my heritage. I didn’t know, until I was in my 30s, that my great-grandmother was Native. I was born in Caracas, Venezuela. I spent most of my childhood there, and then I came to the U.S. and did my middle school on the East Coast in New Haven, Connecticut. I didn’t want to go back to Venezuela. I had already adjusted. We went back to Caracas and I finished high school. I went to undergraduate school. I did a master’s degree, and then I applied for a Ph.D. in the United States because I always wanted to come back. Which is a very complicated thing. I had friends, I had community. My whole family was there, but I never felt like I fit. I had experienced discrimination. That caused a lot of inner conflict for me. I did my Ph.D. here in the United States, graduated, and got a job in San Diego to teach at the University of San Diego. I taught there for 17 years. AS²: Bravo. LS: California was the one place where I did not feel different. And it was not just the Spanish-speaking people, it’s just that there was a sense of belonging, of being accepted, of building community. Also, I learned a lot about the language that is used to oppress others. I learned a lot about history, things that I was somewhat aware of but hadn’t explored before. For example, in Caracas the mountain that surrounds the city — because the city is a valley — is called El Avila. The indigenous name is Waraira Repano [https://www.curiosoteatro.com/2024/12/parque-nacional-waraira-repano-historia-importancia-significado-en-venezuela.html] which I knew, not from school, but from my mother. And then I started digging deeper and found out about the Indigenous people who lived there before the Spanish came. There’s a lot of confusion about who was what, and where they lived, because borders were created, and tribes were separated as well. But I’m still trying to learn, who were the people before me? And I know the Tainos were first, and that connects us to Puerto Rico and the Caribbean. Being in California, and bonding with the land and with the people there, allowed me to open up and to look at a part of myself that I had not looked at before. AS²: Having been born in California, I’m happy California had a positive impact on you. My son’s name is Avila and my brother had a dear friend in Venezuela who brought back a big poster of the mountain that says El Avila and that was up in his room when he was a child. LS: You are a mountain, my child. AS²: That’s funny. A friend of mine, Mamle Wolo [https://africanbookfestival.de/speaker/mamle-wolo/], is a Ghanian / German writer born and raised in Ghana. Her father’s language is Krobo, and the term for mountain and woman is the same word. LS: Oh, wow. I love that. There’s something there. AS²: I’m just curious. Was your MA in Caracas also in languages and letters? LS: It was in Literary and Cultural Studies. But many of the theorists were European. That’s what we were encouraged to use when writing essays or articles. Which I think is why I decided to become a writer. Well, I was already a writer. I already wrote. I was being told “why aren’t you using so-and-so’s work? Why aren’t you looking at this?” And I was like, but these are my ideas! I wanted to discuss from an experiential point of view, and that was not acceptable. AS²: I empathize with that. In the social sciences, we hear “one can’t write this” if it’s not citable, a non-legitimate citation. Unless you turn to qualitative research. At best, this is a way of people longing to have a global theoretical discussion, but at worst it is a new iteration of hegemonic criteria for cultural or literary theory that doesn’t allow one to bring out the language of the mountain. Poet Kamau [https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/kamau-brathwaite] Brathwaite [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDFQOGSgSPw] said, my theory of language is the volcano! I come from an island of a volcano. When he was studying abroad, he defined his own cultural framework for literary theory and used a natural part of the environment to tie onto versus a theorist from a completely different climate. LS: Yeah, I love that. His poems can be used as theory. They’re just beautiful. And they’re rebellious in the best of ways. I hadn’t thought about Brathwaite in so long. I need to go back and reread him. AS²: I particularly like his interviews. It’s one of the reasons why I’ve been enjoying these Inheritance of Peace interviews. How do wonderful people, who are good at different things, come to theorize and understand their own lives? LS: Yeah. They can be so revealing. AS²: So, it sounds like your poetic inquietudes started way back. I guess it was not just political, or socio-cultural, there was some little thing in you. Maybe that’s “the wild little animal?” LS: It is! I was thinking about that recently because one of my first connections to poetry was Lorca [https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/federico-garcia-lorca] (Federico García Lorca). Lorca was not a conformist. We had a lot of U.S. influence [in Venezuela] because of the Cold War. There was so much influence in Latin America from the United States, cultural influence. All the Disney stuff for the kids especially. AS²: Like Ariel Dorfman [https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ariel-Dorfman]‘s analysis of How to Read Pato Donald [https://archive.org/details/howtoreaddonaldd0000dorf]? LS: All that. My mother was never happy about that. So sometimes I would ask, Oh, can I have Mickey Mouse, whatever. Sheets? And she was like, No, we can’t afford it, but I think it was more than that. I think it was, No, I don’t want that influence on you yet. You can decide later if you want Mickey Mouse. But right now, I’m gonna show you what’s here. Both my parents always said, Before you get to know another country, get to know your own and what’s there. “Both my parents always said, ‘before you get to know another country, get to know your own and what’s there.’ I remember on road trips, we used to listen to a lot of folk music, and that’s how I learned history about my own country. Not the official history and the heroes. I learned about place from those songs.” I remember on road trips, we used to listen to a lot of folk music, and that’s how I learned history about my own country. Not the official history and the heroes and all that stuff, but I learned about place from those songs. My grandmother had stories after stories after stories of the Orinoco River [https://www.britannica.com/place/Orinoco-River], and the history of that region which is close to the Amazon. She used to recite the songs, like the “eenie-meenie-minnie-moe,” but in patois. She didn’t say, “catch a tiger,” but it was something else. She partially grew up in Bolivar State [https://www.britannica.com/place/Bolivar-state-Venezuela]. It’s in southern Venezuela. There was a lot of mining, and a lot of oil workers who came from different countries, especially from Trinidad and the islands. They spoke English but they also spoke Creole. My grandmother didn’t speak Creole, but she remembered words. Even the food my grandfather used to make. He grew up on the coast. He used to make this dish called Queso relleno [https://irenecarrillom.blogspot.com/2010/07/queso-de-bola-relleno.html]. That was always a New Year’s dish in my home. It’s Dutch. It comes from the islands, Aruba, Curaçao, Bonaire, and Dutch Guyana which are very close to us. And so, there’s no purity… AS²: It’s the human migration story. LS: Yeah, and it’s lovely. People added whatever was available to them. Nothing is really pure, right? There’s all this combination of lovely flavors and spices and ingredients that make up who we are. AS²: Absolutely. And the songs and the sounds. LS: Oh, yeah. Calypso. I love Calypso. [https://artsandculture.google.com/story/the-dawn-of-calypso-notting-hill-carnival/uAWRguvb_PRR7g?hl=en] AS²: What are examples of the Venezuelan folk music that you listened to? Any particular artist that you remember their names? LS: Serenata Guayanesa [https://folkways.si.edu/serenata-guayanesa-simon-simon/latin/music/video/smithsonian] was a quartet from the Guayana region which is in the south where my grandmother lived, in Bolivar State. They harmonized. They played quattro and mandolin and other instruments. They talked about place. They talked about nostalgia for the past before everything became overly populated. They sang to the rivers. They sang to the flowers. It was just gorgeous. And then Simón Díaz [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeTkY4z4CeESHahGHYEVMLw], he’s actually well known around the world, because a lot of composers have taken his songs and reinterpreted them. He’s from the Llanos [https://www.britannica.com/place/Llanos]which is on the western side of the country. My grandmother was born there, even though she lived in other places, and my great-grandmother too. They knew the family. She always said Simón Díaz was this wonderful person who had taken their roots and what the Llanos are — the cow being milked, and the little ternero, the baby cow. “I loved Calypso. Serenata Guayanesa [https://folkways.si.edu/serenata-guayanesa-simon-simon/latin/music/video/smithsonian] was a quartet from the Guayana region which is in the south where my grandmother lived, in Bolivar State. They played quattro and mandolin. They talked about place. They sang to the rivers. They sang to the flowers. And then Simón Díaz [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeTkY4z4CeESHahGHYEVMLw], he’s from the Llanos [https://www.britannica.com/place/Llanos]which is on the western side of the country. My grandmother always said Simón Díaz was this wonderful person who had taken their roots and [sung about] what the Llanos are.” AS²: Se llama ternero? LS: Ternero o Ternera. AS²: Oh, so cute! LS: And there’s one song that’s very famous, it’s La Vaca Mariposa [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmVDIiCeB60]. La Vaca Mariposa has a baby and everybody’s fascinated with the baby. All the kids and the animals come to see the baby, but they don’t realize that the baby will be slaughtered. And so the song is about that — all that tension between the romanticization of life in el campo and the reality. They make their living that way. It’s their life, right? It’s not the food industry. Yeah. It was a different time. AS²: A different time, a different scale, a different relationship. An awareness of life. LS: Yeah. Certainly. AS²: When you first said “La Vaca Mariposa,” I thought, how is there a flying butterfly cow? LS: I know. I think it was her name. She also must have had some kind of spot on her body. AS²: You mentioned the impact of the Cold War on your family. The Cold War also had a big impact on my family. It affected my grandmother and my father in particular, and when my mother first moved to the United States, she said, “oh, everybody’s afraid. There’s a sense of abundance and a sense of fear.” Because she came here in ‘52. I just wondered if there’s any other things you wanted to mention about the Cold War, because it’s something that we don’t usually talk about, because it’s a little bit scary. There are a lot of reciprocal arguments that were used in the Cold War that are somehow bubbling up again, so I wonder if we should think about it together just for a moment. LS: There’s a cultural aspect of it. For example, El Cine de Oro Mexicano [https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89poca_de_Oro_del_cine_mexicano]. The black and white films, Mexican cinema, and all the songs that came from it. That was very idealistic in terms of la pobreza, it’s a virtue and all that. We watched a lot of those films, and that was Mexico’s counterattack on the United States imposing their Hollywood films and imagery on Latin America. And so, we had on the one hand all the Mexican films. Venezuela also had their own films. But at the same time, we had all the influence of U.S. films, because in Hollywood there’s money. Where there’s money, there’s a way. AS²: And distribution. And a cultural perspective of what is beautiful and what is valuable behind the story. “We grew up under the shadow of the Cuban Revolution, the Nicaraguan Revolution, and there was a lot of hush-hush about it. Even those who had participated in the guerrillas. I was curious. Why? What did you believe in? They rarely talked about it. But, I also saw the scars of fighting a fight that didn’t really pan out the way they wanted it to.” LS: Exactly. But there was also the political side of it. We grew up under the shadow of the Cuban Revolution, the Nicaraguan Revolution, and there was a lot of hush-hush about it. We moved when I was about nine. All these buildings were made for university professors and their families, and the idea was that they were gonna have one of the professors teaching us chess, and we had little competitions and things like that, and another one was teaching us how to play tennis. And it was all free. It was all accessible, so that was the point, that we could have access to all these things, music, and the arts and everything. Because all these professors were willing to give their time for the children that were growing in this community. We did have some of that growing up. But as the neighborhood started to change and shift, we also got a lot of ex-guerrilla people. And they had a very different view of things, but I always thought it was so good to have all of those perspectives in the community. Because my mom, for example, didn’t agree with the guerrilla. I hung out with a lot of kids whose parents were in the Communist Party, or were part of the Communist Party, or had been and so I didn’t see it that way. I was like, these are people just like me. They just have other ideas. Even those who had participated in the guerrillas. I was curious. Why? What did you believe in? They rarely talked about it. But, I also saw the scars, you know, of fighting a fight that didn’t really pan out in the way they wanted it to. So there were all those contradictions, plus all the immigrants coming from Spain after the Civil War, from Italy after Mussolini, from the Caribbean Islands too because the economy wasn’t great. I also grew up around people speaking so many different languages. I’m not surprised when I hear someone speaking another language, and I just immediately get curious: what are they saying? There was so much richness during this Cold War time, but that wasn’t what was being portrayed. It wasn’t just Russia and the U.S. No, there was so much more. Other countries have been affected by this. All those experiences taught me, there’s always more to the story. There’s not just the version that we’re being fed. “All those experiences taught me, there’s always more to the story. There’s not just the version that we’re being fed.” AS²: Absolutely. The human story, the family story. The story of children. Human history is not just the story of the big people in charge. LS: Right. AS²: I hope that you’ve had a chance to teach language through a rich Latin American Studies perspective because when you start to riff there’s so much in your mind. There also critiques of the simplification of Latinidad in the United States, and it’s so nice and refreshing to hear your take on it. It’s a very particular creation of the Chamo and Chama identity that we love and are curious about. Okay, so you were raised in all of this richness. You’re such a globalist. You’ve moved around and learned in so many different places. Studied rigorously, taught devotedly, and also taken a stand for your own voice on the page and in your own self-definition. What would you say if you were to look back in your family lineage, in your human lived experience, what you’ve inherited and what you’ve chosen for yourself. What is your inheritance of peace? Obviously, Venezuela has been in the news. “Growing up there was always a crisis. If it wasn’t transportation, you couldn’t find a specific food product. Blackouts. Sometimes no water, this and that. However we learned to live with that. This is part of my inheritance of peace, I think. If this is what there is, you take it, because you never know when the next thing is gonna come. And you learn to live with what you have. And you learn to appreciate it.” LS: Yeah, a lot. Something I always think about is how growing up there was always a crisis. If it wasn’t transportation, you couldn’t find a specific food product. Blackouts. They’ve always been there. Sometimes no water, this and that. However we learned to live with that. This is part of my inheritance of peace, I think. If this is what there is, you take it, because you never know when the next thing is gonna come. And you learn to live with what you have. And you learn to appreciate it. We didn’t have a yard, but my mother had the most beautiful collection of plants. She would put trays on the window bars with fruit that was left over from whatever we had had, and then the birds would come. And so there was always this connection to the land and to reciprocating. The plants were beautiful because she talked to them, because she cared for them. And the same was true for my grandmother. Sometimes I would get dropped off at my grandmother’s, and the first thing she would do when waking up and after having her cup of coffee was: we’re gonna go water the plants. We’re gonna go take care of the plants. And I would go with her. I just wanted to play with the hose, but she would just show this is how you do it. Sometimes she would point at something. “Oh, look at how the guava is doing!” and “Look at how the platanos are doing!” and “See how beautiful the leaves are?” There was all this connection. “Relationship” was not just with people. Because, of course, we had gatherings and get-togethers regardless of what was happening, and food was being made, and we found ways to enjoy with those around us. But, also, with the tree that was giving us shade and fruit that we enjoyed once a year. “You don’t need to destroy something or to impose yourself on anything. A reciprocal relationship makes a huge difference. That is what I consider my inheritance of peace.” My great-grandmother always brought different types of birds and she would give some of them to my mom. We had all kinds. We had parrots. We had parakeets. I can remember quails at some point. And then my mom ended up setting them free. It was that relationality. No matter what’s happening you always will have that. You will have that relationship that keeps you grounded. And you don’t need to destroy something or to impose yourself on anything. A relationship, a reciprocal relationship, makes a huge difference. That is what I consider my inheritance of peace. Even though in my home, I did not grow up in a safe environment. I knew I had other things, other family members, and people I could count on. But I could also go outside and take a bike or skate, and just be in nature, and be happy to find a way to discover something. AS²: I love that. It’s so beautiful. It’s such a worldview of what is valuable. How shall we spend our time? What is beautiful? What will bring us joy? What will give us a sense of connection? It’s absolutely what we belong to. The natural world. The plants. The animals, birds, and so forth. And this is being taught to you by the women in your life, too. LS: Yeah. AS²: There is a lot of privilege that goes on here [in the U.S.} that is just not known to people who have not lived in, or have family in, the exterior. I guess, a lot of people here are not necessarily, in a lived way, familiar with the world economy. LS: Yeah. Sometimes in the news, they say, okay, this product is sort of running low, and we might not be able to produce it for X amount of time, and then people just go and buy all of it. You know, there is enough. There’s enough for everyone. Why? It’s not just about you having access. We all can have access. AS²: Sometimes there’s themes in the different Inheritance of Peace interviews that weave in and out. One of the things that Beah Bataku [https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/beah-batakou/id1878871890?i=1000754849011] was talking about in her interview is that pressure on access to oil in West Africa translates as what we get to eat for dinner. It’s not just the price of gas. It’s what our meals are made of. This has an immediate impact on hunger. That was at the beginning of the recent U.S.-Israel-Iran War. “Getting rid of one person doesn’t mean you get rid of the whole system. It’s been in place for decades. And people’s mentality has changed, too. Morality has changed. Ethics have changed. So you have to also think about how are you going to work to change the deepest collective fears? Ways of acting. It’s not a superficial change. I understand that people want to have hope, and they should have hope.” LS: And I haven’t lived there for a long time, so I realize I’m looking at it with outsider’s eyes in a way. People talk about the Chavismo and the opposition. No one talks about those who are stuck in the middle. The people who are hungry, who have made a decision to support the government because that is the only way they can survive, or the one way they know how to survive. And I’m not saying the government is right. They have tortured and killed. It’s a dictatorship. At the same time, it’s not as simple as let’s grab this opposition leader and put them in place and that’s going to change everything. Getting rid of one person doesn’t mean you get rid of the whole system. It’s been in place for years, decades. And people’s mentality has changed, too. Morality has changed. Ethics have changed. So you have to also think about, how are you going to work to change the deepest collective fears? Ways of acting, taking advantage, so many things. It’s not a superficial change, that’s not gonna do anything. I understand that people want to have hope, and they should have hope. And that I am in a privileged position to be able to say that because I’m not living there. I also cannot help but look at it with critical eyes. It is complicated because access is a problem, resources are a problem. Not because there’s a lack of resources, but because they have been mismanaged. Venezuela has everything. They have everything. The oil, for me, it’s the least important part of it. From any kind of food, vegetable, meats, fruits, resources for construction, minerals, water, so many things. And it has been mismanaged, not just by this government. All of the other governments have done the same. The people are always the ones who pay for the consequences of those actions. The word that has been coming up for me is greed. Just greed, greed, greed, greed, take, take, take, take. Not just there. Everywhere. Why? When we have so much, why do we need to take more? “Venezuela has everything. The oil, for me, it’s the least important part of it. From any kind of food, vegetable, meats, fruits, resources for construction, minerals, water. And it has been mismanaged, not just by this government. All of the other governments have done the same. The people are always the ones who pay for the consequences of those actions, and the word that has been coming up for me is greed. When we have so much, why do we need to take more?” AS²: Right. LS: In this country too. AS²: Absolutely. LS: Yeah. AS²: It sounds like, when you can say, “I have a critical take. You don’t give a peace prize to a person who’s waged war.” That something in you says, peace is something different. Peace is not a flimsy thing. It’s not a prize. It’s not gained in one act. LS: Exactly. AS²: Maybe inside you, you have a deeper definition of that. You already mentioned your inheritance of peace as being, an awareness that we live within a biome. The economy is a part of a larger system called the ecosphere. We are not the only living things. Be good. Be aware of all the other life around us. If you know what peace is not, then you probably have some glittering, emergent definition of what peace is for you. And we might as well dream. LS: Yeah, yeah. AS²: So, do you have any words you’d like to say about what makes you know when it is peace? LS: The word that’s coming up is respect. Compassion and kindness. Because if we can respect other people’s point of views, even if we don’t agree with them, then we don’t need to fight over it. Right? We agree to disagree. Letting others choose, and they live in the way they want to. Letting them make their decisions. Not assuming that you should do this or that to save them from themselves. Playing a god is not peace. That’s what’s coming up for me right now. “Peace is a word that gets thrown around a lot. But what does it really mean to each of us, and how do we come to a common understanding where we can all work towards it?” AS²: That’s beautiful. And I know you get to do that in your own way, through how you are with your family. How you are with your friends. The kind of learning spaces you create in your classroom, what you do on the page and in your performances and in your literary life. So, I’m grateful to you, your perspectives, and your creative courage. You help me live. LS: Aw, thank you. Thank you for creating this beautiful space. I love the questions, and I love that we can talk about them in such a wholesome way that it’s not just about the concepts, right? But about how we experience, how we live them. And that’s so important. Because I think peace is a word that gets thrown around a lot. But what does it really mean to each of us, and how do we come to a common understanding where we can all work towards it? And I think that is something that you are doing in this spot by creating these conversations with all those different people. So, thank you for the opportunity. Biography Leonora Simonovis [https://www.leonorasimonovis.com/] is the author of Study of the Raft, selected by final judge Sherwin Bitsui as the winner of the 2021 Colorado Prize for Poetry and recipient of an Honorable Mention at the 2022 International Latino Book Awards. Her chapbook, Waiting for a Ripe Mango, was a finalist for the Tupelo Press Snowbound Chapbook Contest in 2019 and her work has appeared in DMQ Review, The Hopper. About Place Journal, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, The Rumpus, Arkansas International, and Diode Poetry Journal, among others. Born in Caracas, Venezuela, Leonora holds a Ph.D in Hispanic literatures from Washington University in St. Louis and an MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University, Los Angeles. She has been the recipient of fellowships and residencies from VONA, the Poetry Foundation, The California Arts Council, The Poetry Lab, the Vermont Studio Center, and Esperimento Sul Respiro. She is the Currents Editor at terrain.org, and a 2024 Harriet Books Reviewer. “Equal and inalienable rights is the foundation, justice, and peace in the world.” - Preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights This interview has been edited and condensed. Subscribe to Inheritance of Peace with Amy Shimshon-Santo on Apple Podcasts [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-interview/id1624946521] or on Substack at Warm Blooded Mammal With Hair. [https://amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/?utm_campaign=profile_chips]Theme music for this program is by Avila Santo. [http://www.avila.santo.com/] This series highlights survivors, everyday people from across the generations and various walks of life —poets, researchers, shepherds, healers — who discuss our Inheritance of Peace as foundational for a just society. This is a reader-supported publication. Become a free or paid subscriber to receive new posts and support our work. If you enjoy this offering, tell your friends and consider making a charitable donation to CREO Changemakers, info@creochangemakers.com. Get full access to Warm Blooded Mammal With Hair at amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/subscribe [https://amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Deike Peters

Reunification as Inheritance of Peace Amy Shimshon-Santo (AS²): This is Inheritance of Peace. I’m Amy Shimshon-Santo. We’re back with a fresh series that aims to create a culture of peace as a personal and global endeavor. In this episode, just in time for Earth Day, we connect with Deike Peters, a German-American educator, urban planner, and environmentalist. Her parents were children of World War II, and the Berlin Wall fell when she was a teenager. A witness to the reunification of East and West Germany, her inheritance of peace is that “peaceful regime change is possible.” Let’s listen in. . . [Deike Peters and students Aayusha Prasain, Taiho Higaki, Aakash Baral, Colby Baker, Jenny (Thao-Linh) Vo, Yakubu Mohammed Abass, Khostsetseg (Chloé) Tumurbat, Miyuki Sase, Nala Thomas, Dimpi Lama, Anh Khue Nguyen, Sarah Truong, study the global significance of the Berlin Wall, 2026] Deike Peters (DP): “Who are you?” always depends on the context where the question is asked. I might say, “Oh, my name is Deike.” Or if I come into a classroom I might say, “Oh, my name is Professor Peters.” I recently introduced myself as a “German-American environmental urbanist. [https://sites.soka.edu/dpeters/]” Which is so funny, because I start with a hyphen, so it’s already a dual identity. And then I’m not even content with describing myself within a single discipline (as an urbanist), but I throw in the environment as well. I guess it’s an indication that we are all multitudes. I’m Deike – and it’s a very unusual name. At least in this country, I often have to just restate my name multiple times for people to get me right. I was named by my mother. It’s a version of a diminutive, a Frisian [https://www.britannica.com/place/Frisia] name. A name that comes from a borderland between the Netherlands and Germany. In a way, it’s an appropriation that my mom just thought was beautiful. My home region in Germany is an old industrial coal mining region (The Ruhr Valley). I grew up in Post-war Germany. It was a region in decline. Dortmund is my hometown and a place where we’re sort of at the tail end of the extraction that happened through the majority of the 20th century: the coal mining, the steel production. Part of my family were people who came to be part of that era of mining and extracting from the late 1800s on, helping and producing the steel that ‘re-steeled’ the country. Industrialization is at the very core of that part of the family history. At the forefront of a lot of environmental conflicts these days is, of course, resource extraction. The fact is that a lot of these struggles are global and united. You trace back some of your own biographies, but hopefully at some point there’s a way to connect dots at a more global level. I am thinking about my own history and connectedness of land extraction. Hopefully you have a path in your life where you move from learning and recognition to at some level being part of a solution. It might have been coal extraction. These days lithium mines are at the forefront of what we might have to resist against. Hopefully you get to do something with your life that is still connected to where you come from. Be a lifelong student. Keep learning. Tap into other people’s wisdom. At some point, you’re on the spot for having to help the next generation of young people point the way a little bit. “At the forefront of environmental conflicts these days is resource extraction. The fact is a lot of these struggles are global. Hopefully at some point there’s a way to connect dots.” When I graduated from high school in Germany they asked: “Who do you think you’re gonna be? What’s your plan?” I wrote in the yearbook: “I want to do something with languages.” Which is hilarious, right? Being a planner was not on the horizon. But I think it makes sense because we need multiple languages. I grew up [around] too much silence. A lot of what we need to be able to do as young people is to translate, broaden our ability to express ourselves. So multiple languages were really important to me. Once I felt oh, now I have a second or a third language as part of my arsenal of expression, what do I do with it? This is where my idea to become an urban planner came from. Become somebody who has “real” skills. Looking at a settlement or actual map-making, planning. I didn’t know it was going to be more counter [https://guides.library.stanford.edu/countermapping]-mapping, [https://guides.library.stanford.edu/countermapping] ultimately. Languages first, as a means of translating and communicating ideas, and then the planning and plan-making as a more interventionist solution-making, skill-building arsenal. Planning [https://www.planning.org/aboutplanning/] is about who’s making decisions in this world. Who’s empowered? Who’s put in a position of laying out futures for us? I know now it was very naive, but I think this idea of plan making was a way to help inscribe rules into the world. Some of us might have to do this, with hopefully different ideas. AS²: I feel so much empathy with what you’re saying, so I’m leaning towards the microphone. When you do go through an advanced education in urban planning, seeing the way decision-making is coming down right now is such a shock. Especially if you learn the scientific method. It’s a slower pace of improvisation based on a feedback system, where you make a little move, and then you assess the impact through data, and then you lean towards the things that are working and getting you where you want to go. So, there’s of course innovation and improvisation in it, but there’s also deep reflection and a circulation of ideas and reflection and ideas and reflection that I think are more likely to guide us towards the kind of outcomes we want. “I grew up in a Germany that was at the very center of the Cold War with cruise missiles pointing to East Germany. Threat of nuclear obliteration was a part of your childhood. The Green Party, at the time, was intertwining social progressive ideals with the idea that we need to think differently about our relationship with the environment. Environmental thinking was going to be our pathway.” DP: As far as urban planning as a profession in Germany at the time, the discipline was explicitly connected to the ecological awakening that was happening. Growing up in West Germany in the 70s and 80s was a post-war environment very different from the U.S. First of all, this crazy idea that my parents’ generation was the “Stunde Null [https://www.dw.com/en/end-of-world-war-two-marks-zero-hour-in-germany/a-53352628]” the “zero-hour” generation. The idea that a country, as a whole, can start over. So you have May 8th, 1945, as the end of the war. But then, all of a sudden, you had a new Germany where supposedly “we’re not Nazis anymore, because the Nazi regime is over.” My parents were 5 and 8 at that point. I grew up in a Germany that was at the center of the Cold War with cruise missiles pointing to East Germany. So the threat of nuclear obliteration is part of your childhood. The Green Party, which was the most progressive political force at the time, is intertwining social progressive ideals with the idea that “we need to think differently about our relationship with the environment.” Environmental thinking as something that was going to be our pathway. Talk about peace, right? It’s a cold war, we’re not hot. The missiles are not exploding. But if there’s a pathway towards a better future, a better world, a better re-entangled way of being on this planet: ecological thinking and systems thinking [https://www.systemspractice.org/resources/art-interconnected-thinking-frederic-vesters-biocybernetic-systems-approac] were what these planning faculties wanted to think about. My planning education didn’t come out of the modernist, dominating tradition of let’s all build neighborhoods looking from above. The kinds of teachers, and the pathway for an education in urban planning faculties at the time, was very inherently progressive. People who had good community organizing roots, and naive hopes for an alternative future. AS²: I really appreciate the hopefulness. My mother, who is in her 90s, said “You have to have a romantic idea.” It’s very hard to get anything done, to mobilize things, without a romantic idea. It gives me a sense that we have a very small flash of time on Earth, and we don’t get to see the bigger picture, and things can change. I guess that’s my romantic idea. We’re not stuck, we’re not powerless, even though it might feel that way right now. One of the classic stories that a lot of Jewish people have said is anything is possible if German people and Jewish people can hang out. You’ve been impacted by growing up with parents who were children of war. That reality may have also demanded the romantic, hopeful environmentalist response. We really know how bad it can be so let’s really try for something very good. In terms of an environmental focus as something that can bring people together across regions and nationalities and cultures. [Remnants of the Berlin Wall at the Topography of Terror. [https://www.topographie.de/en/exhibitions/topography-of-terror] Photo: Deike Peters] DP: When we talk about any kind of reconciliation, it has to be peaceful so there can’t be war. But it also has to relate to the way that we relate to the more-than-human world. My parents, of course, did not have the luxury of reflecting on the past, or where they come from. My parents’ generation is the generation that had to endure the silence that came after the rebuilding. So my mom would always share with us these very, very strong childhood memories. She was born in 1940, so her first 5 years of her life were bomb shelters and enduring hunger. She grew up with a mother who struggled for them to survive, and with a father who, when he came back from fighting in the war, she didn’t recognize. Her earliest childhood memories were of a war that she didn’t understand at the time. I think more dramatically: a war that was also never explained to her afterwards. Her father never was able to speak about his experiences. The German educational system did not really “talk.” There was not a good way in the 50s and 60s to grapple with the enormity of the Holocaust. My mom was sort of a seeker. She didn’t have a college education. She was always interested in history, but I think she felt — I would say on her behalf — a little bit betrayed. She was not the perpetrator generation. She was the recipient. “Growing up, I had the incredible benefit of teachers that had to be very aware of the ‘never again’ part of history, of the grappling with ‘how could this happen?’” Whereas for me, growing up, I had the incredible benefit of teachers that had to be very aware of the “never again” part of history, of the grappling of how could this happen? The 1980s in Germany are that moment where we, as a nation, were talking about, “is there such a thing as collective guilt?” Intergenerational. For me, it’s really hard to fathom how that’s something that you might lose with the next generation. It’s almost like the shaking off of that weight and the historical responsibility of we as a people must uphold certain values. I realized being a young German in the 80s, you can never be proud of where you come from. You can’t ever wave a flag. You semi-understand. So you create new identities. I mean, growing up European. Being multilingual. Speaking a different language to the point where people can’t pinpoint directly where you’re coming from. So, its very interesting to realize at some point, that that’s not a universal thing that every German generation goes through. But, again, that is something that you have to somehow uphold. Then raising my own children, mostly outside of the country, changes things because it changes them. I eventually created a more hyphenated multiple identity for myself, but they were born into it. Yeah, it’s interesting. AS²: First of all, now we see that your love of languages is also your precursor of being a multinational, transnational person. The precursor for understanding another way of being is to be able to listen and hear much less speak and converse. The idea of silence is so fascinating to me because there’s been a lot of silence here. Obviously, the United States was built on all of the genocidal activities that were underscoring the foundation of this country. And when I was studying or living in Latin America, people said, “we understand the United States has a certain relationship to imperialism, and yet we see you as you and not as the government.” And now, with family in the Middle East, I see the negative impact on everyone. I want everyone in the region to have a good life. It is heart-crushing to see so much suffering. Even suffering in the name of the Holocaust, which is absurd to me. My ancestors would never have wanted that to be the outcome of what we went through in Europe. This calls for constant reflection, storytelling, and also staying open. Rather than just saying, all Germans are the same, or all Americans are the same, or all Israelis are the same, or all Lebanese are the same. That’s just foolishness. Don’t we have any authority over what we think, what we do, what we wish for? It’s just very rational and obvious to me not to equate people with their governments. Because we’re seeing how difficult it is to get a democratic process going here in the U.S. Is there anything else you want to share about the idea of silence? It sounds like you were witnessing the silent generation, and also receiving a different kind of education. DP: Yeah. How is genocide a repeated occurrence throughout humanity? It is essential to have had human encounters with Others. People who are unlike yourself and who you learn to love, appreciate, and encounter. At its core, and it sounds super corny, the importance of intergenerational, intercultural, and multi-lingual human encounter. Seeing the other. You would hope that empathy is possible across multitudes and otherness. We’re grappling with the idea that there are certain structural conditions that make genocide possible. Genocide is mass murder usually within the context of an oppressive state. There are belief systems that powerful people and structures are able to institute that make mass murder possible. And then there’s an instrumentalization. There’s something that happens. It’s weapons. It’s violence. But what can break through? What is the other side? What brings a German family to either hide or denounce a Jewish person in the 1930s? What brings you to reaching out or pointing a finger? It’s something in the humanity. In order to be able to understand, you need to be able to listen. So I think at its core it’s communication. That’s what it is. Non-understanding. How do you give someone the means to hear you and to understand? It’s a two-way process, so you have to do the work of making yourself understood. That’s definitely one of these through lines in my life. You need to find some way of clearly articulating ideas. It could be that you need images or tools. Sometimes you just also need to learn who the other person is and not reject that. I’ve also put myself into positions where I needed to challenge, or overcome, that. AS: I’m seeing that there are so many silences. Recently, Ghana argued in the United Nations [https://news.un.org/en/story/2026/03/1167199] for recognition of the holocaust of African people during the transatlantic slave trade. The United States and Israel both didn’t want to recognize that. So, there’s a silencing of what are the facts of history. It’s hard to look at. Part of the value of education is to try and cut through. The opposite of silence isn’t just speaking out. Maybe it’s also what you were talking about — communication. Because communication isn’t just, I’m going to tell you what I think, and what I think is more important than what you think. It’s actually making myself vulnerable and receptive to learn from a different period of time, a different perspective, and somehow gain a larger analysis and understanding of truth and what good ethical behavior might be at this moment in time. “Listening is silence. Silencing is something else. Silencing is a violent act. Silencing is suppression of ideas. And it is absolutely frightening to see how quickly that could happen, and the patterns.” DP: There is a place for silence too. Listening is silence. It’s when you shut up and you hear the other. Right? Because silencing, of course, is something else. Silencing is a violent act. Silencing is suppression of ideas. And it is absolutely frightening to see how quickly that could happen, and the patterns. One of the most memorable and important ways was how my high school history teacher encouraged us to understand German history, and of course Nazism [https://www.britannica.com/event/Nazism] and the Holocaus [https://www.britannica.com/event/Holocaust]t. He started in the 1920s and talked about the structures and the culture of a post-war environment (because there was “The Great War” [https://www.britannica.com/event/World-War-I] in 1914). So, a people that wanted to have strong leadership. People very often think the Weimar Republic [https://www.britannica.com/place/Weimar-Republic] was this beautiful cultural moment where we celebrate Berlin as the center of the world. What happened in Germany in the 1920s is exactly what happened in this country. The rise of authoritarianism. You want to believe in leadership, but people are being convinced by authoritarian propaganda to fall back on simplistic ideals. The parallels are stunning. “What happened in Germany in the 1920s is exactly what happened in this country. The rise of authoritarianism. You want to believe in leadership, but people are being convinced by authoritarian propaganda to fall back on simplistic ideals. The parallels are stunning.” Are we on this pathway of an increased willingness to become violent? Violent suppression — the way that we have just seen in the past year unfolding? Strategic violence. The raids. It is frightening. But silencing is at the core of these things. Silencing whom? It’s the other. It’s diversity. It’s the claiming of dominance. That’s something that doesn’t ever end well. AS²: What is your inheritance of peace? DP: I just did this intensive project with students where I took them to Berlin to study the fall of the Berlin Wall. I was 19 years old when the Berlin Wall fell. The idea is that peaceful regime change is possible. The formal marker of the end of the Cold War is the fall. The fall of the so-called Iron Curtain, the fall of the Berlin Wall, a reunification of a country that had been at the very center of the division, of not just the country but the world. Here is the supposedly democratic, capitalistic west, and the communist east. The two systems we have divided the world between. Here is a concrete physical marker that we — the people— are tearing down within a very short period of time. Then we are left with the task of stitching something back together that probably should have never been pulled apart. The irony is that I wasn’t even living in Germany at the time. I was doing another study abroad, living in France, crafting a more European identity for me. I’ve since reflected a lot on the fact. This influenced how I think about the possibility of a peaceful transition. It’s a given that it is possible to reunite. And you think, that is just right and obvious. I have assembled that, like most Germans of my generation, into an identity as something that’s almost a given. It’s a given that it is possible to reunite. Once again, we are now at a moment where we realize: no, we’re in danger of losing unity on all fronts. I think this is an inheritance of my adolescence. I came of age, and was choosing my future path of where I wanted to be in the world, at a moment where my own country was in one of its better moments. The fall of the Berlin Wall “influenced how I think about the possibility of a peaceful transition. It’s a given that it is possible to reunite. That is just right and obvious. Once again, we are now at a moment where we realize we’re in danger of losing unity on all fronts.” It was interesting to take a group of 12 international students, some of them from communist countries to Berlin. Vietnamese students, Nepalese students, students from Ghana, from Japan, encountering the place for the first time. How do people of an entirely different generation, from entirely different corners of the world, encounter that memory as a teaching moment? When, for me, it was a reality that sort of happened to me. I didn’t make it happen. Yeah. So, inheritance is also an intergenerational project. An inheritance of something that’s given. My inheritance is reunification. AS²: We’ve had so much harm on top of harm on top of harm, and normalization of that. You see people saying we just need to win by being stronger, by being the bigger bully, by showing more force. I love that your counterpoint to that, from actually having been born into a place that was so deeply impacted by war, is not domination. It is unification. It is the fall of a wall. It is, what are our common points? Which does sound very romantic. “One of the things we need to hear is that regime change is always possible. Because we think of things as entrenched. One way of flipping it, and reframing things is always to say: ‘No, we can point to the moments where change was possible.’” DP: The reality of course is complicated. It wasn’t really unification. In so many ways it was a taking over. Yeah, I don’t want to be misunderstood. I’m not romanticizing what actually happened in the process, or what happened in the years since, and how the country has turned out to be, and how fragmented it is now, and all the problems that came with it. But we recognize the symbolic power of the moment. One of the things we need to hear is that regime change is always possible. Because we think of things as entrenched. So one way of flipping it and reframing things is always to say: no, we can point to the moments where change was possible. AS²: Just for clarification in our current context, we’re not talking about taking over another country as regime change. We’re talking about taking responsibility for our own spaces, with certain values, and certain actions as regime change. We’re all a part of this since we are wrapped up in a global economy. We are wrapped up in a global war economy. “Regime change” is not, you must change so that I have more comfort, but we must change so that we get peace and sustainability. DP: To clarify, the Berlin Wall was erected by the East German socialist regime as a so-called “anti-fascist border protection wall”, so it’s the walling in of East Germans. How was that change possible? It wasn’t because Ronald Reagan just screamed “Let’s tear down this wall.” We needed the Gorbachevian Glasnost and Perestroika. We needed someone to not escalate. We needed someone to not militarily, violently oppress. A quest for freedom and openness. That’s what I mean. AS²: “A quest for freedom and openness.” I love this. I appreciate you so much. You are such a wonderful presence in my life. I am grateful to you for coming on and sharing your time with listeners, but also for your friendship and neighborliness. Thank you for deciding to be a transnational human being, to speak different languages, connect with different places, and to invest in the next generation. Thanks for sharing about your own legacy, your own origins, and how these lessons have affected who you have become. “How was that change possible? It wasn’t because Ronald Reagan just screamed ‘Let’s tear down this wall.’ We needed the Gorbachevian Glasnost and Perestroika. We needed someone to not escalate. We needed someone to not militarily, violently oppress. A quest for freedom and openness.” DP: I love this project so much. It is kind of amazing where you end up in life ultimately, and how there’s more of a pathway, a red thread, that you realize looking back. I ended up becoming a teacher and a professor at a liberal arts college that is ostensibly built upon Buddhist traditions of peace and reconciliation and disarmament. And I’m neither Buddhist nor Christian anymore. It’s this idea of interfaith communication also. When you really start talking human to human, your faith is not the first thing that matters. You see the greater values shine through in many ways. And then you build community out from that. I have taught so many students. For some of them their faith is a big part of their identity, or it might not be. It’s not the first thing that we have to flag. But in these big violent conflicts that we’ve alluded to, that is something that people foreground. AS²: In a way, we get to experience something that our ancestors may have thought was never possible, and it’s completely possible. I find myself involved with interfaith work. I love working with the Muslim-Jewish Alliance. It’s so healing for me. It brings me closer to any future of accountability and common care and something beyond Jewish supremacy, or Muslim supremacy, or Christian supremacy. It is just a world of difference. I’m rereading the work of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8Nze5yu0f5L0qpm13w7kdpMFdsZX6VNx] now. He was very involved with the Civil Rights Movement, and he had many thoughts about the importance of interfaith communication [https://utsnyc.edu/wp-content/uploads/Heschels-No-Religion-is-an-Island.pdf]. That’s why it struck me when you said communication. I am leaving our conversation with how important communication is. It’s receptivity. It’s mutuality and valuing of a different opinion and a different experience without fear that one will be demeaned or overpowered in some way. I feel like there is a protective quality to friendship, probably because it’s the door to communication. “True faith doesn’t fear the difference of ideas. I think that’s such a hard thing to understand because dogmatism is the opposite of that. It doesn’t allow for the difference, or the variety, or for the openness of ideas. So much of war and violence is based on fear of the other.” DP: The really important word that you just used was fear. Fear and faith. True faith doesn’t fear the difference of ideas. I think that’s such a hard thing to understand, because dogmatism is the opposite of that. It doesn’t allow for the difference, or the variety, or for the openness of ideas. So much of war and violence is based on fear of the other. Are you fearing it because it’s challenging your own identity? It’s challenging the way that you live? It’s challenging what you want to believe about the world? I think communication is about overcoming that fear. AS²: My grandparents on my father’s side divorced, and my grandfather married another Jewish person who said, “I cannot stand the sound of German.” She was so traumatized by the Third Reich that she couldn’t imagine a new relationship to German people post-Third Reich. One of the things that’s so beautiful about a conversation like this is to understand — as these Artemis II astronauts [https://www.nasa.gov/gallery/lunar-flyby/] keep on trying to say as they come back to Earth — that our well-being is wrapped up in each other as earthlings. DP: The blue planet! That’s the other watershed moment, right? I was born in 1970, so the picture was already there. We already had the incredible benefit of looking at the blue planet from space. That’s about framing and perspective. The zooming in and the zooming out. And a part of what we’ve talked about is, when you get to see something up close you encounter it. But stepping back, or zooming out and gaining perspective, is just as important. Hopefully the astronauts bring back the message that from far away these things look a lot more together. “Look at the blue planet from space. That’s about framing and perspective. The zooming in and the zooming out. When you get to see something up close you encounter it. But stepping back, or zooming out and gaining perspective, is just as important.” AS²: For sure. But also, we don’t even have to be astronauts. I feel that just with you. I’m sure you do this in your life, in your research, in your classroom, and in your friendships, so thank you so much. DP: Yeah. Embodying things rather than just spelling it out. Maybe that’s the last thing about silence. Quieting the mind, or silencing. Silencing is an act. But silence can be meditative and convey a lot of understanding without the words. Additional Resources: The Berlin Wall: Encountering a Memorial Site of Global Significance [https://sites.google.com/view/berlin-wall-encounters/home?authuser=0] Deike Peter’s Academic Website [https://sites.soka.edu/dpeters/] “Urban Nature in Need of Ecological Restor(y)ation” [https://academicminute.substack.com/p/deike-peters-soka-university-of-america-urban-nature-in-need-of-ecological-restoryation?just_subscribed=true] “Igniting Passion for Urban Nature” [https://www.soka.edu/news-events/news/igniting-passion-urban-nature-interview-associate-professor-deike-peters] “Equal and inalienable rights is the foundation, justice, and peace in the world.” - Preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights This interview has been edited and condensed. Subscribe to Inheritance of Peace with Amy Shimshon-Santo on Apple Podcasts [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-interview/id1624946521] or on Substack at Warm Blooded Mammal With Hair. [https://amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/?utm_campaign=profile_chips]Theme music for this program is by Avila Santo. [http://www.avila.santo.com/] This series highlights survivors, everyday people from across the generations and various walks of life —poets, researchers, shephards, healers — who discuss our Inheritance of Peace as foundational for a just society. This is a reader-supported publication. Become a free or paid subscriber to receive new posts and support our work. If you enjoy this offering, tell your friends and consider making a charitable donation to CREO Changemakers, info@creochangemakers.com. Get full access to Warm Blooded Mammal With Hair at amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/subscribe [https://amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Paul & Michaela Shirley

PROTECTING PEACE AT HOME Creating a culture of peace can begin with the first people we know — our family. Today’s episode with Paul and Michaela Paulette Shirley focuses on familial love and support as an Inheritance of Peace. Michaela’s significant work in Indigenous Planning is shaping what is possible in community development, educational policy, and ethical research. She’s the daughter of two phenomenal people: Paul and Dolly Mae Shirley. Paul comes from a long line of Diné sheepherders and Michaela is an urban planner and doctoral candidate in American Studies. In this interview, Paul and Michaela, reflect on life lessons from Isabelle Shirley — Paul’s mother who lived for 99 years. They speak about lessons learned from family, our relations to the land and livestock; and the value of discipline, work, and protecting peace at home. [Paul Shirley standing with his mother Isabelle Shirley. Photo courtesy Michaela Shirley.] Michaela Shirley (MS): I am Michaela Paulette Shirley. My clans are Water Edge, born for Bitter Water. My grandparents are of the Salt and Coyote Pass clans. I am originally from Kin Dah Lichii, which means Red House in northeastern Arizona, located on the Navajo reservation. I am so happy to be here. Thank you! I’m joined by a very special guest who is very important. I’ll let him introduce himself. Amy Shimshon-Santo (AS²): Yay! Great. Paul Shirley (PS): I was born and raised as a sheep herder. I’ll be turning 73 next month. This little bordertown we have is along the I-40 New Mexico borderline. That’s where we’ve mostly been going to get our stuff, which is 45 miles back towards Arizona, towards Window Rock, where we come into. We’ve been at a bordertown all our lives. With my five daughters, and so many grandkids, we had to travel to Phoenix, Tulsa, Seattle and places like that once or twice a year. That’s how we come to be. Still having my grandma’s herd of sheep, which my mom took over. So, recently now, I have it, with 30 heads (of livestock). AS²: I’m so glad to be here together. Mr. Shirley and Michaela are some of my favorite people in the world. Thank you so much for making time to be together. The next question is about what you get to do. That might be a bit different for both of you. For Paul, you mentioned sheep camp and sheep herding, and Michaela is into research and studies. What do you get to do with your life force? MS: Okay, well, I’ll let my dad go first. [Paul Shirley seated beside his wife Dolly, their children standing in a row behind them, on the occasion of his 65th birthday. Photo courtesy of Michaela Shirley.] PS: All our grandkids are pretty well taken care of. So we hardly have any time with them just once in a while. Like, summertime, there’s maybe a few days. So that’s one good thing. We raised our girls to know how to take care of their own kids instead of the grandma or the grandpas doing the job for them. We’re less stressed that way. That’s what the kids like to come back to. The grandkids. AS²: Do you want to say a bit about your grandma’s herd of sheep for people who haven’t felt what it’s like to herd sheep? PS: Well, my mom was the only one that didn’t get her education. Her siblings, younger brothers and sisters, all went to boarding schools or wherever but she never went to school. That’s why my grandmother gave the Sheep Livestock Permit to her to take care of alongside us — being me, my two brothers, and two sisters. Five of us. We maintained my mom’s business of sheep herding. That’s primarily what our girls did, was participate with my mom during the summer at the sheep camp farther into the mountains. My mother, all she did was walk, walk, walk after the sheep all her life. That’s what put her to the age of 99. So she finally passed last year. All she stood for was disciplining. She never gave up on discipline. That’s why now, that’s what I stand with. Being able to discipline people that don’t have the right track of mind. AS²: Mhm. And know the difference. PS: We were totally able to get rid of people, like, what you help us get rid of that time you visited. I admire how you traveled by yourself to Albuquerque that time. All by yourself. Yeah. All our girls were like that. They know how and manage to travel by themselves. Especially our first one, the head of the girls, now had to go back to Seattle by herself. She’s a hustler like you on the highway, on the open road. [Michaela and Atlas Shirley.] AS²: When you gotta get someplace, you just gotta get there. PS: Yeah. They all like doing that because they don’t want to be pampered by anybody else. They like to do it themselves. AS²: That’s a lot of strength and will. PS: Yeah, that’s what I’m proud of. Me and the mom (Ms. Dolly Mae Shirley) we’re proud of our kids and grandkids, and three great grandsons. AS²: I know they’re proud of you too. PS: Yeah. MS: Dad, did you want to tell how you start your day, everyday? PS: I start my day with hot coffee in the morning. MS: He makes the best hot coffee. PS: Talking about sheep, we butchered yesterday and we had roast mutton on the grill. There were 20 people. Mostly the relatives. That’s what we experienced. And Michaela enjoyed her mutton. AS²: I bet. [Paul Shirley seated beside a photo of his grandson Atlas. Photo courtesy of Michaela Shirley.] MS: Yeah. I’m the family member that has always taken the higher education route. So my daily life is very different, but every step along my journey, my family has always been very supportive of me. Whether they were offering their prayers for me, for success, or even monetarily. And now these days helping to take care of my 3-year-old when I need to do some stuff for school. But all along the way, my family has been very, very encouraging and supportive. My mom and dad have always been the ones to pay for my application fees: my undergraduate, my graduate, and now my second graduate degree for my Ph.D. program. They have always made their mark in that very special way for me. My parents and my family have always been very supportive and loving in that way. And even now, they’re always asking me questions about what the whole process is like. And that was the beauty of the morning that my dad and I got up early, after they brought home my son from him being two weeks away from me because I had to finish my comprehensive exams. My dad was the one that made coffee and was curious about what the process entailed. I showed him what I was working on at the end of this exam. I have this framework I’m trying to build, and it’s tied back to schools and how we are trying to build better communities in our reservation. Because our reservation is homelands that are very, very important to us. Thankfully, we’re an Indigenous tribe that still retains its original territories. That’s not the case for some other Indigenous peoples who’ve been removed. PS: Relocated. MS: Yeah. But, for us, thankfully, we are where we are from originally. So, all of my work goes back to trying to figure out strategies and ideas for how to go about our future planning. And it all does start with the teachings from my late Nali, Isabel Shirley, who is my dad’s mother that he spoke very admirably about. She comes up a lot in our stories, even in our daily lives. She was always so strong mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and there was nothing that could keep her down. So the essence of who she is as a person, I really want to keep honoring and respecting that in my work. At the same time honoring and respecting my parents, and the lands that we definitely still have. My dad plays a really big part of staying connected to the land by having a grazing permit which is how Navajos have to go about their sheep herding these days. Having to inherit a sheep permit. AS²: Do you want to say any other words about the land that you belong to or are connected to? MS: Well, for us, and a lot of other Diné families that practice this tradition of burying your umbilical cords and your placenta in the land. That’s something my mom and dad still do to this day for all of their grandkids and great-grandkids. No matter where you go in the world, you will always remain connected. That’s home. And that is important, because for a lot of Diné families, we end up having to out migrate to places far beyond our reservation territory boundaries. Like my dad saying “Seattle, Tulsa, Phoenix.” Those are distant places that we’ve had to go to in order to secure the best opportunities for ourselves.That’s also why the planning work I’m trying to do is ensure that we don’t have to leave our reservation in order to pursue those great opportunities. I don’t think I would have that sort of connection, or passion to our homeland, had it not been for my parents dropping us off during the summer for sheep camp. “We were taught not to be claiming lands. Primarily, on my mom’s side through her culture. Never to say “this is my land.” All she would say is: ‘What’s 6 feet under and so many square measurements, that’s where your land is.’ - Paul Shirley PS: For my part, pertaining to land, we were taught not to be claiming lands. Primarily, on my mom’s side, through her culture, how she really disciplined us was never to say “this is my land.” That’s not proper for her. Not a human being. But livestock that graze on the land. That is primarily what I stand with. AS²: You don’t own the land. PS: Yes. All she would say is: “What’s 6 feet under and so many square measurements, that’s where your land is.” [Dolly and Paul Shirley, Michaela Shirley’s parents.] One thing my mom stood with was: Be a man. Be a woman. Be respectful. She did not like domestic violence among families. She pretty well maintained discipline when her in-laws came about (In-laws will come in peace or us [kids would] never be there). Try to deal with positivity, and not be too negative about anything. Just be happy and have a good time with your family. That’s about it, and that’s how our grandkids are raised. They’re taught respect. “One thing my mom stood with was: Be a man. Be a woman. Be respectful. She did not like domestic violence among families.” -Paul Shirley AS²: Our last question is do you feel you have an inheritance of peace? PS: I would have to have an interpreter with education like Michaela to understand in my culture what that question is. A prime example of understanding the words . . . Most people, the majority of people, do not know the meaning of words that they talk and deal with every day. Especially the work, W-O-R-K. AS²: You had mentioned that your Mom was walking for most of her life. I thought, is it work or walk? She was walking with the sheep for most of her life, right? PS: Yeah. And able to understand, talk with the sheep and the dogs here. I was left alone at 10 years old with the sheep in the mountains because my mom had to participate in ceremony. And she never [had to] worry about me. I was able to talk to the sheep and the dogs and the cats. Day and night, especially at night. And I know how to deal with being scared. AS²: How do you deal with being scared? PS: Just tough it out. I know crying ain’t gonna solve that problem. You just have to talk to your dogs and the sheep. Get to know even the birds, or whatever animal is living out there. Ants or squirrels. Chipmunks. You just live with them, that’s it. AS²: Live with them. PS: One thing I forgot to tell you was that in the early morning hours at dawn, people would get thrown out. Get their sheepskin taken out from under them and get chased out. And the reason why was because of the corralling of Navajos, to participate in the long 300-mile walk to Fort Sumner, New Mexico. They used to call them “police.” The teaching was to outrun the police. “Run hard.” That was stamped deep into us, our generation. I think that’s where it ended. But before, my mom and my grandma were deeply more into that — outrunning the cavalry. And that’s why people learned how to just be quiet and to outrun any danger that comes forth. That’s primarily what the teaching was, to just to run hard in the morning and run hard every day — which was exercise, I guess. AS²: Absolutely. PS: All that leisure that people have to this day. Looking at television. That’s what my main teaching from my mom was: Don’t listen to any gossip. Don’t be greedy. Don’t be jealous. The Ten Commandments of the Bible, those were her teachings the majority of the time. Not to giggle or laugh in any public places. Act like a woman, not some wild girls. That’s how she disciplined the girls. And us men, the main thing she taught was not to run away from your kids. That was her primary teaching. Don’t ever gossip. Don’t ever do stupid things. You’ve got your five senses. Your ears, tongue, eyes. Mainly the ears. You have to listen to what you’re being taught. That was one goal that she lived with. Stay in shape. Get up early. Don’t gossip too much. AS²: Love it. PS: That’s about it. Hopefully I’ve covered everything. [Dolly and Paul Shirley with their grandson Atlas, Michaela Shirley’s son.] MS: I would say to help bring our conversation to a close. I really didn’t know what to think about in terms of your question “what has been my inheritance of peace?” For me, it’s very important that we amplify peace that comes in the form of love and support in your family, and with your family, and you have to protect that as much as you possibly can. So, in terms of, the intergenerational peace. Peacekeeping, or peacemaking that my dad was talking about, started with my Nali [Isabelle Shirley] because she was in a domestic violence situation with her children. So it’s also the reason why she didn’t want to remarry, like my dad says, with another man after her husband passed away. And then there’s the second peacemaking with my dad and his upbringing and the importance of just trying to maintain that for his family. I always take a lot of great pride in knowing that I had a childhood where I never saw my dad hit my mom, or them yell, or get angry at each other. Our home was always peaceful, and it was always clean. There was always food at home. There was always a lot of great childhood memories in terms of that peace that was there. So, now I’m the third generation of that peace, and my son is the fourth. I too want to provide him the most peace I possibly can in our home because it’s what he’s going to remember when he’s older. It’s what he’s going to carry on with him and his children later on. There is so much violence, hate, and negativity, that my dad is saying, is out there in the world. “It’s very important that we amplify peace that comes in the form of love and support in your family, and you have to protect that as much as you possibly can.” -Michaela Shirley If you can have a life that’s peaceful, it’s your home. That can come within four walls. It can come within the territories that make up our territory. But yeah, peace. Where I find it is at home. And, like my mom says, “It doesn’t matter where your home is. What matters is where your family is.” We have family in a lot of places, so should I ever feel like I need to get out of any kind of danger, I know I have a strong family network that I can rely on to do that. And I think that’s pretty much how I would want to round out our conversation, as well as focusing on the peace of the home. [Amy and Michaela in Albuquerque shortly before Atlas’s birth.] Resources Dine’é Bikéyah, N. D., Charley (Navajo Nation), E. V., Lopez-Huertas (Maya K’iche’), M. J., & Shirley (Navajo Nation), M. P. (2025). Restoring our tomorrow: planning for who we are. [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/11771801251363133]AlterNative: An International Journal of Indigenous Peoples [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/11771801251363133], [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/11771801251363133] 21(3), 540-549. M. P. Shirley and K. Jackson, “Shí Yázhí ‘there is money underneath your fingers [https://iopn.library.illinois.edu/scalar/etal/sh-yzh-there-is-money-underneath-your-fingers],’” Et Al: New Voices in Arts Management, [https://iopn.library.illinois.edu/books/pww/catalog/book/15]2022. Biographies Paul Shirley is a loving father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and a husband. He was born in Ganado, Arizona and resides in Kin Dah Lichii, Arizona on the Navajo Nation. Paul is Bitter Water clan born for the Coyote Pass clan. His maternal grandfather is of the Long House Hopi clan and his paternal grandfather is the Big Water clan. He is an intergenerational sheepherder and a retired heavy equipment operator. He enjoys ranching, herding sheep, movies at home and in the theater with his beloved wife, Dolly Mae Shirley. Michaela Paulette Shirley is a doctoral candidate in American Studies at the University of New Mexico. She identifies with the Water Edge and Bitter Water clans, with her maternal grandfather from the Salt clan and her paternal grandfather from the Coyote Pass clan. She was raised in Kin Dah Lichii in northeastern Arizona on the Navajo reservation. With over ten years of experience in Indigenous planning, community development, community engagement, qualitative research, conference planning, and technical assistance training and workshops. She is currently serving as the KSU Tribal TAB Program Manager. “Equal and inalienable rights is the foundation, justice, and peace in the world.” - Preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights This interview has been edited and condensed. Subscribe to Inheritance of Peace with Amy Shimshon-Santo on Apple Podcasts [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-interview/id1624946521] or on Substack at Warm Blooded Mammal With Hair. [https://amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/?utm_campaign=profile_chips] Theme music for this program is by Avila Santo. [http://www.avila.santo.com/] This series highlights survivors, everyday people from across the generations and various walks of life —poets, researchers, shepherds, healers — who discuss our Inheritance of Peace as foundational for a just society. This is a reader-supported publication. Become a free or paid subscriber to receive new posts and support our work. If you enjoy this offering, tell your friends and consider making a charitable donation to CREO Changemakers, info@creochangemakers.com. Get full access to Warm Blooded Mammal With Hair at amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/subscribe [https://amyshimshonsanto.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]