I had a podcast interview recently with a wonderful host who was all smiles and had the most upbeat, positive energy. Talking with her was like a quick blast of sunshine. We talked about how much good we can contribute to each other and the world just by being friendly and radiating love, warmth, acceptance and genuine support for others.

It almost felt jarring to bask in the positivity of that conversation because just the night before I had been watching “The Heart of Invictus,” a documentary about a special Olympics created by Prince Harry as a venue of healing for injured vets from all over the world. The documentary captures some of the essence of my book, America in Therapy. It takes the viewer unapologetically into the extreme suffering and tragedy of war, while at the same time, our hearts are pierced by the courage and resiliency of so many of its survivors. We get to see the power of healing that comes from individual care and support for PTSD and life-long painful physical challenges, and we get to see hearts healed with loving attention to relationships and community building among people often isolated and shut down due to massive trauma. As I have said so often in my book— our worst injuries come from failed human relations and must be healed with safe, caring others. “The Heart of Invictus” is a beautiful example of the life-giving, restorative power of love in action.

But what if we committed to ending war? What if we committed to ending such profound and needless human suffering?

All of this makes me think of something I wrote in America in Therapy:

“It is a strange place to stand, here on the bridge between The Terror of the Situation and the Hope for Our Country {and the world}. I think this is where we stand if we can allow ourselves to know it. I for one want to bridge the great divide between us, and I hope you are walking with me. I see this as the next leg of our evolutionary journey, and for that we will need a new energy source. It won’t come from fossil fuels, the sun, wind, or water. It will come from inside us, from harnessing our hatred and the need to destroy and using all that energy to come back home to one another. The Hope for Our Country is that we see this now and that we can have compassion for ourselves and all others for the hard road we have often walked.”