Love is what we need

In the past week the world watched horrified at the picture of a three-year old Aylan Kurdi washed up on the beach in Turkey. He came from Kobani, in Syria, which has been hit hard. While doing my research for this article, I found my self becoming angry, so I instead of writing fact filled article, I will write from my heart.

This weeks song touches on the subject, but it could be as well about the millions that came before him and the millions that will come after him. Conspiracy theories are running wild, and it shocks me how fast we are willing to ignore the facts. These are people running away from their homes. They are not leaving their home behind because “it is not good enough.” They are running away to stay alive! Their city has been 70% destroyed. I’d like you to think about that for a second, if your home town or a city was 70% destroyed? And your neighbour across the border would block any efforts of the outside world trying to help you?

Those of us living in the western world are lucky in a way that we have been able to travel. Travel for us is a luxury, that we associate with holidays, or work. Now think for a second about traveling away from your home knowing you might never see it again?

But the most important message of this weeks song “Love is what we need” I would like you to take with you is to open your eyes. We get so desensitized to suffering and hardship, while watching it through TV screens, that we ignore it. This time it was different, it was a child and it happened in a place we know. Most of us know someone who has been on holidays in Turkey, or been there themselves. I know it can be a hard thing to do, but we can’t turn a blind eye anymore. The map of middle east drawn after the first world war (by the Western world) will change in our lifetime, I have no doubt of that. We need to become part of the solution, not part of the problem.

We fear the unknown, that is part of our natural self-preservation system created by the mother nature. But in these moments of crisis, we cannot be controlled by that fear. It is love that we need. Love for the fellow human beings on this planet. The best way to remove that fear is by learning and understanding. The western world has been good at pushing our solution to everybody else. That’s like patient giving a blood transfusion of wrong blood type. We might mean good, but in real life we are doing more harm.

By coincidence (if you believe in them) this week’s song landed on the same day that 14 years ago the world as we know it changed. I am of course talking about the 9/11 attack. Even though 14 years have passed, the wounds are still sore. A lot of people on that dark day lost their lives while in service, whether they were emergency services or law enforcement. I am sure every single one of them were scared on the day, but they didn’t do their service out of fear. They did it out of love for the fellow human beings. And their sacrifice should never be forgotten.

So once again I ask you to make change. And do it where it matters the most, in your heart. Don’t let the fear guide you, but love. Love is a powerful force that we are not utilising in large quantities enough. Hate will never overturn hate, but love can crush it. Too long we have let hate and fear guide us, and this has led to only more warmongering. It has sent our fellow human beings in the frontline to sacrifice their lives. It has sent oil prices through the roof in the past, it has profited the weapons manufacturers, it has destroyed millions of homes and innocent lives.

I am not expecting to change the world with this weeks song, or any song for that matter. But if I can stop you for a second and think about how you could let love guide you, not the fear, then we are onto something. And please feel free to download this weeks song from my Bandcamp page HERE and share it and this blog post with the world. Change starts one person at the time.

J.P.

The author J.P. Kallio is a singer songwriter
To get EIGHT of his songs for free go HERE