Recipe for Peace

Here is a recipe for peace that seems workable to me now:

1. Always hold the intention to behave in as loving a way as you know how.
2. As long as you know #1 is in place, behave according to your leading, without thinking about it.
3. ACCEPT the consequences of your actions. Don't explain or justify, to yourself or others. Accept others' reactions. Don't start planning your behavior in expectation of others' known reactions. Respond to them with love, regardless of how they interact with you. Demand nothing of them. If you must plan your behavior, plan it according to what gifts you may offer lovingly to others, that they will want. The best such gifts are those of physical and emotional comfort. To the poor or afflicted, give food and useful items. To the rich, give affirmation.
4. The very luckiest of the rich might then come to want challenges from you. Give these reluctantly, if the receiver insists.
5. People can and do go from "poor or afflicted" to "rich" and back multiple times in one conversation.

#4 is certainly still theoretical for me. I put it in because it doesn't seem moral to give only affirmation to the rich, without the possibility of giving them challenges.

For now, though, I can, without moral compunction, give them only affirmations. They have plenty of challenges that they don't ask for. They will only benefit from receiving a challenge they really, really want.