It was in the temple at the Yoga Retreat at Paradise Island, Nassau that I first had the vision from which the True World Order, TWO, grew. I saw a wall of fire and people fleeing to escape the fire, breaking boundaries to do so. I wondered, what can I, a solitary person, do? I founded TWO with the purpose to train ‘leaders’—and we can all be leaders in our own field—in yogic discipline to attain peace and tranquillity. The principle of TWO is that we must find peace within ourselves before we can find peace outside.
Suppose I have a piece of cloth made up of cotton thread. If I want to change this cotton cloth into silk, every thread must be changed. Then only will I have a silk cloth. Cloth is nothing but the thread. Similarly the world is nothing but individuals like you and me. Until each one of us knows inner peace, there can be no world peace. An inner awakening must take place because the survival of the world depends upon it. In the near future we may not survive if people do not take a positive step to change their lives. We have to find peace within ourselves, then only can we have external peace.
Serve, love give, purify, meditate, realise. Do good, be good, be kind, be compassionate. Adapt, adjust, accommodate, bear insult, bear injury, highest yoga. These are the teachings of Swami Sivananda and the teachings of yoga and we are following them to bring unity in diversity, using yogic discipline and the yogic way of life. War is going on constantly, this is the way of the world. TWO is to remind us that we should live as brothers and sisters on this planet. We must try to remove the idea that I am different, I am white, black and so forth. Yoga teaches that we are the immortal spirit. Until we find this spirit, until we know that everyone is made up of the same consciousness, the same dignity, there will be no peace. And that is why TWO is training people to find this dignity within themselves, to live peacefully on this planet while we are here.
Let us not fight. Let us bring this message of TWO; unity in diversity. We should allow everyone to keep their religion, their language, their culture, their way of life. There is nothing to condemn. We can have beauty by having all these things. There is beauty in different languages. Different religions will be there, different colours will be there, different customs, different philosophies, different thinking. If we can live peacefully, respecting each others’ wishes, each others’ religions and philosophies, and yet staying with our own philosophy, our own religion, our own faith, our own way of life, this is beauty, this is unity in diversity.
– Extract from The Great Vision p.96/97