When you study international affairs you often find yourself reading and writing about war and

conflict. You spend many years trying to understand the causes of confrontation among states and
among governments and civil movements, you spend a lot of hours reading about how violence
was used in this or that war, you analyze some indicators that shows different levels of conflict
according to the number of deaths related to certain conflict in one year and you read a little bit
more trying to find a suitable explanation for this simple question: Why do we kill each other?

Some day it’s possible that you wake up and think that although you have been studying for many
years the manifestations of violent behavior and aggression you haven’t understood why human
beings are capable to harm one another. And then, like it happened to me, you try to turn around
your subject of study in order to keep your sanity and your hope in mankind.

That day, some years ago, I quit studying violence and I started to study peace, I renounce to study
the causes of violent conduct and I began to learn about the origins of forgiveness and
compassion, I give up my need to accumulate knowledge and I decided to be an active agent of
social transformation, I stopped thinking in an arm solution to my country’s inner conflict and I
open my mind and my heart to a negotiated resolution of our differences.

My journey started that morning and it took me to Africa one year later. I needed to see with my
own eyes what Mandela and Tutu (among many others) had achieve in South Africa and I was
desperate to see how people in Ruanda were able to move forward after 1994s genocide. I will
never in my life be fully “recovered” from that trip.

In Africa I learn that human beings are capable of the most horrible atrocities but we are also
capable to forgive, forget and move forward. I saw how hatred can be a political weapon used to
segregate people but I also saw how love, faith and hope can drove millions of people to believe in
a future without racial divisions, I saw how after death it’s possible to think about life.

What I experience in Johannesburg, Cape Town, Pretoria, Windhoek, Kampala and Kigali opened
my eyes to a new universe of concepts and ideas about peace and peace building. I can summarize
all of my learning in one simple phrase: peace it’s not a political imposition, it’s a personal
decision.

In that trip (organized by the University where I work) a knew an amazing person. An
undergraduate student passionate about African studies and about conflict resolution. I
remembered that every time we were about to eat he closed his eyes with a smile in his face for a
few minutes and that gesture cause me a lot of curiosity. Someday I asked him: Nicolas what are
you doing? And he answered me: I am meditating. I wanted to ask more! I wanted to more know!
But I decided to wait for a good place an moment to hear Nicolas explanation about he’s silent
time on the dinning table.

The location was Queen Elizabeth National Park at Uganda, we were staying at a lodge and it has a
very big outdoors dining room. I remember like if it was yesterday. The full moon was in the
middle of the sky, we were drinking hot coffee and Nicolas started to talk…
He told us about an organization named Peace Revolution that promotes world peace trough
meditation and he told us that he has recently being in Thailand where he learned more about the
connection between inner and outer peace. In that precise moment something in my heart and in
my mind just clicks and I thought: I need to know more!

From that moment on I became a permanent visitor of Peace Revolution´s website. I spend hours
reading about the origin of the organization, I enjoy myself watching the pictures and the videos
posted by the crew and a dream about knowing that beautiful island in Thailand where all your
problems seems to go away while you meditate. But, I must admit, my desire then was bigger than
my discipline. I started the self-development program but I wasn´t able to sit quiet for half an hour
and after that share my impressions with my peace coach, I found myself submerged in my work
and my daily routine for many months and I just put aside the idea of meditate.

After Christmas 2012 I was spending my holyday´s vacations in my hometown and I was looking at
the beautiful scenery around me, full of mountains, trees, birds, and flowers and without even
notice it I close my eyes and I started breathing really slowly. I stayed there for about half an hour
and when I opened my eyes I felt calm, relax and fresh. I wanted to keep that feeling inside me; I
wanted to be able to go deeper, so, I decided to re-start the self-development program.

For 42 days I dedicate about one hour and a half to meditate and write my daily entry in the
website commenting my impressions on the meditation, the techniques I use and some of my
opinions about different subjects. As the days went by I felt a change inside me, I felt more happy
and more relax, in other words, more peaceful. I felt that I have given up aggression both towards
others and myself; I felt that I was building peace in my inner world and in the universe. In that
moment I decided to apply for the Agency to be on the one of the participants of Global Peace on
the Move X, knowing that the possible trip to Thailand was going to be the beginning of a longer
and deeper trip.

I will love to write many pages about my travel experience from Colombia, trough the United
States and Japan before I arrive to Bangkok, I could spend hours and hours picturing with words
the colors, the smells and the spirit of Thailand, I could go on and on remembering how beautiful
was to feel the warmness of Peace Revolution crew and how they take care of every single detail
in order to make us feel welcome and the expectation of knowing people from around the world,
but, unfortunately, that isn´t the point of this article, I am going to focus in my inner experience.

Of course I enjoy the delicious food, the warm weather and the magnificent view of the Island, but
today, when I remember all of those days, I really treasure the pain I felt in my legs and in my
lower back after the meditation sessions, I smile when I recall being extremely tired after five or six
days of activities, I think about how hard it was for me to write in my journal once I arrive from the
evening meditation. I think about how many times I wanted to say I can´t be still! Or I just can´t
visualize my center! Or it´s to hot! Or to cold!