What Do We Mean by Peace, Love & Friendship?

Our world changed in September 2001. In the wake of 9/11, we saw the two extremes of the human spirit. On one hand, there was this incredible surge of love and support as the world came together in grief. But on the other, a darker side emerged: a world suddenly filled with fear, suspicion, and deep division. As a naturally joyous person, someone who has always looked for the best in people, that shift was a shock to my soul. It didn't make sense to me that we could go from neighbors to "others" so quickly.

People often ask us what we mean when we talk about Peace, Love & Friendship.

Bluntly: we are a lot less likely to kill each other once we’ve shared a grandmother’s recipe or a childhood story.

It is easy to hate a concept. It is easy to fear a group. But it is incredibly difficult to harbor that same animosity toward the person sitting across from you who just told you about the way their mother used to spice the lentils, or the one who shared the exact same childhood fear of the dark that you had.

At the GodLuck Club, we aren’t just having dinner. We are practicing a radical kind of diplomacy. We are using the dinner table as a neutral ground to humanize the "stranger." When we understand the "why" behind a tradition, the fear starts to dissolve. When we see the person instead of the dogma, the division starts to heal.

Peace isn't just the abolishment of war; it’s the presence of understanding. Love isn't simply an emotion; it’s the active choice to hold space for someone else’s understanding and experience. And friendship? That’s the blossoming notion that we have a lot more in common than we’ve been told.

Peace, Love, and Friendship may have had a big moment in the 1960s, but they are timeless, always inviting us to practice them again, and again, and again.

We have faith that one day, our collective humanity will finally get it.