Finding Peace

This is a talk about how we can find and share peace. I speak with Deidre Teagarden, Director of tne Nisei Vet Memorial Center about how we can find and live with peace in our lives. I was awarded
the UNESCO Peace Award as a music producer,author/poet, and started the Peace Project to further peace.

Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without.~Buddha Peace

Transcript

Aloha,

Welcome to the Peace Projects.

I'm Cindy Palos and I'm here with a wonderful friend and she's part of our Peace Projects team,

Deidre Teagarden,

The Executive Director of the Nisei Veterans Memorial Center.

Deidre,

It's so nice to have you here.

Well it is wonderful to be here with you Cindy and all of your friends and it's really an honor to be on your first show.

I am excited about that and excited about everything that you're doing as it relates to peace.

I think you're just,

You're marvelous and congratulations on putting this together.

Well I invited you for a couple of reasons.

You have been an inspiration for this in many ways.

The work you've done with your mother,

Your mother Melinda,

I'm going to have on the show next week,

Is a peace activist and she was an inspiration for so many.

She has a passion for peace.

I've barely seen it in anyone.

She took you to Japan when you were young.

She went and interviewed many of the survivors of Hiroshima.

She's worked and knows the importance of peace and because of everything that you've learned going and growing up and spending time in Japan,

You speak fluent Japanese and you now work for the Nisei Veterans Memorial Center.

You're able to communicate in Japanese and you've gone to Japan many times and you've been influenced by the understanding of how the peace effort is so important.

And I thought what a unique opportunity to understand you and your mother,

The influences of her dedicated work for peace and how important that really is.

I mean you truly are living what your mother has taught you through your work.

So how when you first were young and seeing your mother's work towards understanding the importance of peace,

How did it affect you and how did it kind of influence you as you are in your work today?

Well I definitely,

Both my brother and I are very thankful to our mother for taking us to Japan back when she did.

We lived there for several years and yes she was doing research on at that time interviews with A-bomb survivors in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and it was in the early 80s that she was doing this and we have the I guess the honor to learn these stories firsthand.

I mean they're very difficult stories but as you will speak with her next week,

You know these people really allowed us to learn firsthand the devastation of war,

The devastation of the nuclear bombs and how they were able to go beyond that devastation and that violence to live lives of their own and I think what was so surprising is there wasn't a you know I guess we would assume that there was a hatred or dislike toward Americans but we never,

We really never encountered that.

The people that we met with had gotten beyond that to talk about the importance of never having something like that happen again and so every day we just heard those messages of peace and not to focus on all of the travesties that had happened rather take all of those,

Understand what they were and move forward to make sure something like that never happened again and I think that philosophy had a big impact on both my brother and I over the years to this day.

And it's interesting from that early influence which is life-changing really.

I mean very few people could say they grew up,

That are from the West,

Could say they grew up with that kind of background to where you are now at the Nisei Veterans Memorial Center again hearing stories from the very brave and valiant and many times humble beyond belief humble survivors of those who fought in World War II when the rest of their family and friends and countrymen were often put in concentration,

Concentration camp,

They were put in internment camps and meanwhile they were out there fighting for peace,

Having to survive and many of them didn't survive the Battle of World War II and you've heard some stories from them that are also life-changing.

Yes,

I mean the story of the Nisei soldiers of World War II is just one that is heart-wrenching and at the same time is full of valor and these were men who a nation had decided were enemies just because of how they looked because Nisei means second generation Japanese,

Sansei is third generation Japanese but a lot of these men primarily from Hawaii and then of course on the West Coast they were called aliens and they,

Especially on the West Coast but also here in Hawaii we had a definite internment story where the professors,

The businessmen,

The teachers,

They were all put into internment camps and on the West Coast you have a much larger internment story but yes so these people's parents were put in internment camps,

Shipped away and yet their sons went to fight for America to prove their loyalty and I think it was President Truman at the end of the war said to this specific group of Nisei soldiers,

You fought not only prejudice on the battlefields far away,

You fought it right here at home and won and as a result our,

You know,

Hawaii was transformed by their coming back and opened up many opportunities for those next several generations of Japanese Americans but they all went with the,

Those values,

Those values of responsibility and loyalty and duty and you know shame,

Don't shame your family,

You know,

You go and fight,

You are Americans and even though you're of Japanese ancestry and yeah there are so many stories that are just,

You know,

You can't believe them but we had one of our,

One of our veterans in one of our oral histories said,

You know,

We did what we had to do at that time.

Many of them came back of course,

Started businesses,

Got into politics but a common theme that we hear from them has been,

You know,

War,

War is hell,

Don't go to war,

Be nice to one another,

It's just,

You know,

Your,

What you lose is not,

Is not worth it.

So the stories and the sacrifices of those men and their families are something that we,

Old is our foundation,

We share those and we also like to share that message of let's not make these same mistakes again whether it's internment or war.

So beautifully put and I can't help but think as I'm listening to these stories and what you've been through and what they've been through,

How important it must have been for them to learn to forgive because the families,

I mean some of them lost everything and didn't get back what they had.

There were people who were doctors,

Lawyers,

There were wonderfully dedicated people who'd done nothing wrong who lost everything.

There were these people who went and lost their friends who were niseis who died,

So many died in these battles and the pain and resentment could have completely eaten up all of these people's lives if they didn't learn forgiveness.

So I think there's a theme that I might like to explore a little bit how forgiveness can bring peace.

You know you're exactly right,

I hadn't thought of it like that but you're right,

It is all about forgiveness and in every aspect of what we do,

Isn't it?

Well I mean if we are to learn as you have from all these amazing stories,

Think of all the stories that are literally movies in your head that you've experienced from listening to these people's live stories,

But if these people who have gone on to be leaders in their own right,

Even here in Hawaii,

So many who were involved in politics,

If they hadn't learned to forgive and change their course,

If they had taken that anger and hurt and resentment and let it grow,

They would have not been able to continue to just even where you're sitting right now because the Nisei Veterans Memorial Center was built on the dedication of these people who were so brave and wanted and were so completely feeling they had to do something important that was valuable that was good from their experiences.

Yes,

You know there was a luncheon in 1952 where the returning hundredth infantry guys got together and they adopted a motto of continuing service,

Giving back to your community and each island here in Hawaii,

That manifested itself in a different way and for us here on Maui,

It was basically our center which took many years and many amazing people and lots of hard work to create,

But it started with an intergenerational center so on our campus we have both a preschool and an adult daycare center and then of course we have our center downstairs with an education center where we hold exhibits and an archive with over 200 special collections from Maui's Nisei and Sansei veterans,

But the point is,

Yes,

They forgave somehow and they came back to do great things and we wouldn't be here if it weren't for them and for their idea of continuing service.

And the 442nd regimental combat team,

They adopted the motto of go for broke,

Just give it your all and I think those two mottos really share exactly what these men and their families were all about because the families sacrificed so much also.

If we just were to take that concept of forgiveness and put it in our minds to the Middle East and to the Palestinian and Israeli conflict,

There's been such a desire for peace for so long there and now of course there's so many people around the world,

But if for just a moment we could understand how forgiveness could change the hatred,

The death,

The conflicts,

The devastation that happens,

But it seems so hard for some people who are so favorably wounded inside that they can't forgive that seems to continue and perpetuate on and on to the point where some people say,

Well,

There never can be peace in the Middle East.

How many times have you heard that people said they tried,

They tried and they failed.

So we have to then take that concept back to inside us because Buddha said,

Peace begins with them,

Don't look for it without.

So if indeed I think that these Nisei veterans,

I think that the families,

I think that the people that had to be interned in those really difficult camps,

I wonder if their philosophy and maybe even Buddhism or something found that place of peace within them,

Found that place that they were able to achieve that peace that might've then been able to carry forth that healing process.

You know,

I often wonder if because the Nisei,

The second generation whose parents were Issei,

First generation,

If they were somehow able to take that philosophy of Buddhism and forgiveness and respect and endurance,

You know,

That is such a big concept in Japan of gaman.

It's not just patience.

I mean,

It's hardcore endurance.

They were able to take all of that and also mix it with that American,

You know,

We're going to get it done,

That Americanism to have this really,

I don't know,

Come up with this philosophy of combining the two of them.

If that helped them along the way,

I don't know,

But you know,

You talk about Buddhism and everything is within.

I mean,

If that is true,

If we all were able to practice forgiveness and we could start with really little things like forgiving your friend on Facebook for not having your exact political ideas.

You know,

There's so much of that.

You can be both.

You can love your friend and at the same time,

Perhaps disagree with their philosophy about,

You know,

Whatever it is.

If we can really,

Doesn't mean you have to accept it.

It doesn't mean you have to accept that viewpoint,

But perhaps you can still love your friend.

You know,

Where is that balance and how do we make that happen?

Thank you for bringing that up because I know you ran for office and you're certainly qualified.

You have a wonderful background and you have all the qualifications and you are a woman,

But there are other women who run for office,

But it did get extremely painful and negative.

It's very hard when people bring out tools that are frightening,

You know,

And attack in ways that are shocking sometimes,

Even here in the land of Aloha.

And I have to bring up that your mother,

Your wonderful mother,

Melinda Clark has tied in and she did a piece pilgrimage sharing the Aloha and she understands that concept of Aloha and the importance of it and I keep saying if we can't have Aloha,

And this has been challenging times this last year,

And if we can't share the Aloha here,

Where in the world can it be shared?

You understand that because your mother's passion for Aloha.

You're exactly right and you know,

I think whether we talk about the Nisei values or the Buddha taught,

You know,

What our state teaches,

You know,

The law of Aloha is written into our constitution here in the state of Hawaii and that's huge.

And yes,

Aloha,

My mother made these pins that she took with her to Japan on her pilgrimage about Aloha and the idea of it and it was beautiful.

She gave them out all around at the different temples and different people she met.

We,

But yes,

I mean,

Hawaii is known for its Aloha.

We,

It's in our constitution,

We talk about it,

But sometimes perhaps we don't practice it as much as we could and if you really look at the meaning and what Aloha is supposed to do,

I think that is just another way that if we actually practice that,

You know,

Practice the golden rule,

Wouldn't things be better little by little.

And Aloha is needed,

Always needed,

But it's needed now especially because there's so many people who are full of fear.

I see a lot of fear coming in about what's going to be happening politically,

Yes.

Also what's going to happen when visitors come back and fear about people catching COVID-19,

Fear about so many things and I have to see that seeds of fear wherever there's fear,

You can see peace going right out the window because fear is the opposite of having peace.

When you're at peace,

You're not full of fear.

When you're at peace,

You are finding that place inside where there's love and contentment and understanding and it really is the fear completely can dissipate that peace when you have fear.

You know,

And I agree and I think that you can still be cautious,

But you can also have peace.

You know,

It's not as if you have to be either or.

I think this is just my opinion,

But I think sometimes in Western culture,

We jump to it's either this or it's that.

You're either right or you're wrong.

If you don't agree with me,

I can't speak to you anymore.

I mean,

We are a divisive,

Maybe it's a divisive mentality,

Whereas,

And again,

Just my own opinion and this is growing up for many years in Japan and China and living there,

There's more of a,

There's more of that middle area.

There's more of that gray area.

You can be peaceful,

But you can be cautious.

You can endure,

But you don't have to accept poor treatment.

There's a way to balance the two.

And I think if we could find as humanity more of a balance,

It doesn't always work.

Of course,

There are extreme situations and that's just the way it is.

But I think that there's a way that we can practice more of a balance and realize that you can be afraid of COVID.

So therefore you can be cautious and you can wear your masks and you can wear gloves when you fill up your car with gasoline,

If you still have a gasoline car.

There are things you can do,

But you can also be at peace and to find that perfect balance,

That is the Holy Grail.

Well that's also in Buddhism called the middle path,

Which is Buddhism is called following the middle path for that reason,

For exactly what you so beautifully said,

Because when you are in that middle path,

And sometimes that middle path can be called also a razor's edge because you can slip either way and fall off.

But yeah,

It doesn't have to be either or if you are centered with your intention on that path and intention again of resetting yourself of doing something good and working for good with peace in your heart and peace in your soul,

Then yes,

All the rest teaches us as we go.

And it's not easy,

I mean,

Because we are facing a lot.

I understand that when I got that UNESCO peace award,

I was so blessed to be on a webcast like this.

It was really my first big webcast.

I didn't have a light,

I didn't have the other things,

But there were people from everywhere working on peace,

People from Nigeria,

People from Japan,

People from South America,

People from Canada,

People from all around the world.

And when I was able to see that this is a worldwide thing of people working everywhere,

Understanding that importance of peace,

And that is,

Yeah,

We're not perfect,

But that is part of their intent and understanding of how important that is.

And there's people like your mother that raised you to understand these things.

I think there's probably more people alive right now understanding the importance of peace than ever before,

And yet still we're practicing.

Every day,

Like you said,

We're learning as we go,

And sometimes the hard lessons,

Like well,

For example,

What people went through,

The Nisei veterans in World War II and their families,

The hard lessons sometimes can teach us the most.

That's very true.

And if we practiced peace or if there were more peace classes or in school,

And I know that they are,

People can get their degree in peace education.

Really?

But I know Rotary does a peace certificate,

And there are other peace institutes out there which are wonderful.

And if we were able to take that idea of peace and make it a little bit more mainstream,

I don't know,

I mean,

Everybody knows,

I don't know.

I'm just pontificating.

But one of the things my mother talks about a lot,

And it really helped me,

Was observation versus judgment.

I think as humans,

We have a tendency to judge.

We judge others,

We judge ourselves.

Everything is a judgment.

And if we were able to just kind of shift our mind and think of judgments more as observations,

If you look at something as an observation versus a judgment,

It's a different feeling.

And she talked about that a handful of years ago.

And I always try to have that in the back of my mind to look at something,

Whether it's something I've done,

Maybe I didn't do my Zoom correctly,

Maybe I forgot to put the camera on,

Oh,

What a horrible mistake.

Well,

Actually,

That's a judgment.

Maybe I just observe and then learn for next time.

But that's a tiny,

Ridiculous example.

But there are much bigger examples.

And if you just take a day and try to observe instead of judge how different it feels at the end of the day,

That would be a challenge.

That in my writings,

I've written many times about the term the objective observer.

And that part that you're talking about is exactly that,

That part of us that can discern,

We're watching,

We're discerning,

But we're not judging,

We're just going,

Oh,

This,

This,

You know,

This,

This,

This is this.

But then you took it even one step further,

Which I really appreciate,

Which is taking responsibility.

Because with judgments,

Basically,

We are putting our blame on other people.

So we don't take responsibility for ourselves.

And once we take and again,

I go back to Buddhism,

And there was a lovely teacher.

And I just loved him.

He was in in Paia.

And I went with him to Tibet.

He's no longer around.

But,

But,

But he always said,

And one of his last talks at the Paia,

As endo,

There was I take blame for everything,

I take responsibility for everything,

I don't put it on anyone else.

And when I take responsibility for everything around me,

Then I can change and I can control myself out of my ego,

Not with the ego is the ego responds and gets upset,

Then you have responses that are not from the objective observer,

There's reactions versus non reaction,

You know,

There's that moment of like,

Ah,

Ah,

I'm here because I can learn from,

But it's hard not to kick in that reaction of the ego,

You know,

And once you do,

The other person almost always react backwards,

It is very hard to then you then you have the acceleration of a problem.

When you when you judge from the ego,

And you can't necessarily take it right back,

If there's a response,

It's even stronger back at you.

We have this gentleman who comes to the office,

He is in his late 70s.

His name is Mr.

Ito,

Retired businessman,

He comes and he cuts our grass twice a week.

And he doesn't have to he just he does it out of love for the center.

But he has these wonderful ito isms.

And you know,

He'll come and I'll say,

Oh,

So and so we're supposed to be here.

It's you know,

Such and such a time for a meeting,

Where are they?

And then he says,

Well,

You have to be so thankful that somebody is late.

Because it will help you appreciate more when someone else is on time.

Or I'll complain.

Yeah,

I mean,

You know,

Me,

I complained a little bit,

You know,

Maybe about the election.

Somebody said doesn't agree with me.

And he said,

Well,

That's wonderful.

The more people that disagree with you,

The better it is,

Because you can look at,

You know,

Back at your own ideas and see where you know,

Maybe you could you could fix them.

And anyway,

I have them all written down in a book.

I love those.

Maybe you could just frame them put them in little things.

I mean,

What a wonderful spin.

Well,

Yeah,

It's a great spin.

So the next time,

So whenever I get a little frustrated with with life,

I go to my little Mr.

Ito book.

You'd say you've written the Eto isms dad,

I write them down a little post it notes that I put them around my office and every now and then I'll come across one.

Well,

I see them framed in little beautiful frames and put up on the wall.

You know,

If people want to understand what we're talking about,

I recommend they try to find you whether you whether they're here on Maui or not,

They can go to NVMC,

The Save Veterans Memorial Center,

Nvmc.

Org.

Yeah,

Have hundreds of stories.

You are just an amazing resource.

There's movies,

There's clips,

There's so much that people can learn.

And I honor the fact that you understand the importance of that and you're dedicating yourself to preserve what has been learned from these wonderful people.

Well,

It's it's really an honor to do it.

We love what we do here at the center.

We have a dedicated team,

Dedicated board,

Dedicated supporters,

You know,

Anyone who walks through the door,

Of course,

We're doing it by appointment only now because of course,

It's COVID.

But,

You know,

Everybody who walks in these are uniquely American stories.

Also,

We always tell people you don't have to be Japanese American,

You don't have to have a love of history to enjoy the stories that are here that go beyond politics or ethnicity or gender,

Anything like that.

These are just amazing stories of humanity,

Which every culture has,

Of course,

And we're very honored to share the ones that we have.

And I thank you,

Cindy,

Because you are just a huge advocate of everything that we do.

And I'm in awe of all of the work that you do.

And I want to say thank you.

And I do want to just give a shout out to the fact that you have some wonderful,

I'm probably going to mispronounce it,

Take?

Take?

Yes,

Take.

It's the Japanese word for bamboo.

And we started this series where we invite leaders from across the state and nation to come on and talk about this new normal that we're all going through.

We've had everyone from the president of New England University of Hawaii,

The CEO of Central Pacific Bank,

To come on and talk.

And Take is bamboo,

Which is known for its resilience and flexibility during difficult times.

And we named the series Take.

And it's an author series as well.

So that's all at NVMC,

Nisei Veterans Memorial Center,

Nvmc.

Org.

And I thank you for taking the time.

You had to get in early,

Set everything up there.

And you helped me learn how to do my Zooms.

You took the time to do that amidst your very,

Very busy schedule.

And I appreciate you and the Peace Projects will continue with your mother.

Next week,

We'll record one of those and they'll be available.

I'm going to also put them all up on the Peace Projects.

That's with an S at the end for a reason.

There's so many thepeaceprojects.

Com.

I have peace quotes up there.

I have a peace meditation up there.

I'll have the audio of all these posted up there as well.

And it's just my way of giving back after I was so touched to receive the UNESCO Peace Award.

And so it's just my way of saying yes,

This is something I can give back as you give back and what an honor to be here with you today.

I thank you so much.

A big,

A big gosho of all gratitude to you.

Beautiful Deidre T.

Garden.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And thank you for what you do.

Thank you very much.

Congratulations.

And I can't wait to watch the other interviews.

Thank you.

Aloha.

Aloha.