The Basic Element for Peace is in Connection

04/18/2023

The Basic Element for Peace is in Connection

To be a person is to have a story to tell.
Isak Dinesen, 1885-1962, Danish Author

The World Forum on Early Care and Education is just two weeks away. Among the presenters who’ll be there is Martha Llanos of Peru. In a compelling video recorded at the 2019 World Forum in Macau, she shared, in part:

In Latin America we had a wonderful teacher and poet Gabriela Mistral who said, "the name of a child is today." I think that sounded so short, so simple, so beautiful, so easy to remember. She has offered the world such a deep, deep food for nutrition, for reflection, because really if a child is today, why do I always have to be seeing the child from a perspective of the future? …Of course, you would like to contribute to a better future, but you are forgetting the most fundamental essence that is today: what I do right now, what it happening to me now, how I feel…

I believe we are at this moment speaking very much about Sustainable Developmental Goals. What do you want to sustain? I've been asking that question to all my colleagues. We have Goal 1, 5, 10, etc… all isolated things…We would like as a goal a sustainable peaceful world. For me, peace is the essence. I feel that working towards peace make us very flexible, because—like in the World Forum—when you have the opportunity to learn about others, to meet with others, to hear about them, the development of empathy, the basic principle, the basic element for peace will be there.

View Martha’s entire message and learn more about participating in and connecting in person or virtually with colleagues like Martha at the 2023 World Forum on Early Care and Education in Panama City, Panama.

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