Nature Science

DREAMS OF FREEDOM & PEACE

Giant flock of white doves flies up into the air.

Courtesy of United Nations. “Afghanistan International Peace Day.”

We have a dream that all people in this world will be inspired by beauty, so that they seek to discover, create and share it to make the world a more beautiful place for all the people in this world.

Beauty is subjective, of course. But the feeling that it fuels is fairly universal. It makes us feel better. It inspires us. It gives us hope.

There’s something about beauty in the world that transcends politics, religion, economics, philosophy, sexism, racism… The problems arise when groups or individuals believe that they are more entitled to experience beauty than others… and that’s when it gets ugly.

Today, on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday, we are especially inspired by his "I Have a Dream" speech, delivered during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963, calling for an end to racism in the United States.

There, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, in Washington DC, over 250,000 civil rights supporters felt the power of Dr. King’s dream, as he referenced the Emancipation Proclamation, which freed millions of slaves in 1863. Over 150 years later, rampant racism means that people are still not truly free.

But we still have a dream. And we still have a hope that humanity can find beauty together and in each other -- that together, we all can make more beautiful things happen in the world right now.

Little girl swings on a swing.

“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other- -that man, that woman, that child is my brother or my sister. If everyone could see the image of God in his neighbor, do you think we would still need tanks and generals?”

-- Mother Teresa

Trees in winter standing at edge of forest.

“When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world.”

― John Muir

Snow-topped mountain seen through colorful flags in China.

“Nature has no principles. She makes no distinction between good and evil.”

-- Anatole France

Sunset reflects on the water.

“Lose yourself in nature and find peace”

-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Man sits on a rock inside a cave as a ray of light shines down on him.

"When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace." -

-- Jimi Hendrix

Milky Way Galaxy rises about Mt. Buffalo.

"Peace may sound simple - one beautiful word - but it requires everything we have, every quality, every strength, every dream, every high ideal."

- Yehudi Menuhin

A bare tree stands alone in a green pasture on a cloudy day.

“All those who love Nature she loves in return, and will richly reward, not perhaps with the good things, as they are commonly called, but with the best things of this world-not with money and titles, horses and carriages, but with bright and happy thoughts, contentment and peace of mind.”

-- John Lubbock

People showing spirit at a Martin Luther King March for peace.

"One day we must come to see that peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but that it is a means by which we arrive at that goal. We must pursue peaceful ends through peaceful means."

- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Aurora Borealis swirls in the sky around the North Pole, as seen from Bear Lake, Alaska.

“Peace is always beautiful”

-- Walt Whitman

Two white doves eat seeds from a man’s hand.

"Human Beings, indeed all sentient beings, have the right to pursue happiness and live in peace and freedom."

- Dalai Lama

Portrait of a woman as she sleeps and dreams.

Read more about Freedom all this week on BeautifulNow, including Set Yourself Free: Beautiful Road Trips, Freestyling Awesomeness: Lorenz Holder, and Keeping Beauty Wild & Free. And check out more beautiful things happening now in BN Wellness, Impact, Nature/Science, Food, Arts/Design, and Travel, Daily Fix posts.

Woman walks through a sunset reflection on the beach.

Want more stories like this? Sign up for our weekly BN Newsletter, Like us on Facebook. Follow us on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest. Join our BeautifulNow Community and connect with the most beautiful things happening in the world right now!

Woman in a white gown lays in the shallow water lapping up on the sand as she daydreams under dramatic clouds.

Do you have amazing photos? Enter them in this week’s BN Photo Competition.

Newborn infant sleeps and dreams.

IMAGE LIST

Image: by JosephB. “Without a care.”
Photo: Courtesy of Standing on a Beach. Uravik, Stockholm.
Image: by Alan Grinberg. “Feilasi: Blowin' in the wind.”
Image: by Red Junasun. “Port Meadow.”
Photo: Allen Buckman. “Peace Cave.”
Photo: Glen Rush. Teton National Park.
Image: Dutchy_42. “Milky way rising high above the Hump (Mt Buffalo).”
Photo: Nick Fullerton. Lone Tree.
Image: by Elvert Barnes. “ReflectionsOnPeace88.MLKM.WDC.”
Image: Beverly. “Aurora Borealis, the colored lights seen in the skies around the North Pole, the Northern Lights, from Bear Lake, Alaska.”
Image: by Victor Paul. “Two doves.”
Image: by Alyssa L. Miller. “Peace. Lucy's Balloon."
Image: by chiaralily. “Daydreams.”
Image: by Philippe Put. “nathan 1.”