What will you do to make peace on September 21?

Jeremy Gilley has a powerful idea: Persuade everyone in the world to live in peace for just a single day, every September 21. Everyone, you and me included.

Watch this energetic 15-minute video of Jeremy telling his story at TED – including how he got the Taliban’s commitment to the day, then scroll down for some of my ideas about ways you and I can participate in a real way in your own day-to-day life.

[Can't see the video in your email? Click here to go directly to the video online]

It seems to me that the tempting thing to do here is say to ourselves, “What a great idea! I’ll pass this along to everyone I know and we can all observe the day together.”

The braver, better thing to do, though, is do more than observe the day — to act on the day instead. Here are some ideas for what you can do on September 21 to contribute to this Peace One Day, small acts with potentially big reverberations:

• Commit to not bicker with a specific loved. Decide to break the cycle of bickering that, over time, can build a divide between you.
• Reach out to someone you’ve had a tense relationship with lately and break bread with them. Go out for coffee and focus on conversation that makes you laugh and enjoy each other’s company, to rekindle the good in your relationship.
• Reconnect with someone you’ve not spoken with in a while. Email them on September 21, tell them that you’ve been thinking of them and that this day seemed like a particularly perfect day to reach out and reconnect.

Gilley has ideas for more public actions you can take on his website and I encourage you to check those out. Yet why not spark peace close to you as you also try to spark it in the wider world around you?

I’d love to hear what you’ll do on September 21 to act on Peace One Day. Please share your ideas and commitments in the comments (if you’re reading this in email, clicking on the title of this article will take you to the page where, when you scroll down, you can leave a comment)!