Tonight I attended a fundraiser at The Zoo to raise money towards the court costs of those Brisbane folk who were arrested while at Baxter 05.

Enjoyed groovy music, caught up with a few people, had a few drinks, listened to some speeches, watched some propaganda. All good stuff.

Towards the end my friend Bronwen and I hung out with an Afghani refugee who is on a TPV. He spent 16 months at Port Headland IDC. I expressed to him the shame I felt, but he said I shouldn’t feel shame because it’s not me who supports this policy. Easy to say. Hard to hear. Not good enough really.

This morning I went to an inner peace concert at Roma St Parklands to hear a band called Bliss whose songs are based on meditations (sounded like normal music to me!). The concert was organised by an Indian yoga group and was called BLISS: Inner peace –> world peace. They had angels that handed out flowers, conducted a meditation session (albeit interupted by screaming kids) and had firetwirlers. More spiritual and personal than political, but I mention it here because I received a ‘thought’ card from the group that alluded to the fact that world peace starts with inner peace.

I do believe if I found more peace of mind I would a happier person, but I fear becoming too self-involved or ‘selfish’. In essence, the life of an activist is pretty selfless. They give so much of themselves to a cause and to the community. It’s a sacrifice that they make. However, how far should that go? Perhaps if I find time to heal myself, I will be better able to tackle healing the world. Who knows.

Am I a fighter or a healer? I don’t know. Here inlies my dilemma which is why I mention the inner peace concert within these activist musings.

Inner peace, outer peace, out.