From our bookshelf, "The Power of Eight"

Welcome to Five Minutes of Peace, a time for you to reflect, recharge, and renew. Five minutes to awaken something within yourself. Created by the Peace room.love

Today's reading is from "The Power of Eight, Harnessing the miraculous energies of a small group to heal Others, Your Life and the World," by Lynn McTaggart.

Chapter 10, Hugging Strangers,

Sylvia Frasca, an Italian-born translator who lives in Rowan, France always had far too much on her plate, but her work schedule the week before the peace intention experiment started had been so demanding that she had been working all day and through the night.

On Monday, the second day of the Peace Experiment, still exhausted from her previous week's grueling schedule. She participated in the day's group intention and suddenly felt lighter and physically much better. This feeling increased dramatically as the week went on, and she felt a special bond growing between the other participants of the experiment and the Sri Lankans.

On Tuesday, her mood became buoyant and she felt her constant worry about work leave her.

By Wednesday, she realized her priorities had completely changed. That evening, she made a pact with herself. Never again would she allow herself to be working night and day as she had done the previous week, her relationship with her partner was changing too.

Although she practiced Reiki healing, her partner, an atheist who had always prided himself on his logical mind, refused to allow her to do reiki on him for more than a few minutes.

On Thursday. For the first time, he gave himself over to an entire hour-long session. They connected in a way they'd never had before. The following day, they had the deepest discussion they'd ever had about Reiki spirituality and Sylvie's father's spontaneous healing from Chronic Citis. For the first time, their discussion was enforced and he was sharing the conversation rather than trying to change the subject.

On the final day of the experiment, knowing that she would be traveling back to Italy from France during the time of the experiment, Sylvie planned to send her intention from the car, but asked her partner to light a candle for her and to join with the peace ceremony himself.

Shortly after the 10-minute intention, her partner called Sylvie to say that something really unusual had happened. As he was looking at the picture of the waterfall on the Peace Intention Experiment website, he felt pulled into it by a strong, warm, comfortable feeling, and he came away from it overwhelmed by positive feelings.

Ever since he badgered her for more information about the experiment, trying to figure out what exactly had happened to him. It was already clear to me that the group intention experience caused some sort of major change in individual consciousness, but an even more complex alchemical process appeared to be going on here.

Something about praying in a group caused deep, possibly permanent psychological transformation in many participants and improvements in their daily lives. The experience appeared to carry on for a majority of my participants, long after the experiment was over as though they had been touched by something immensely profound. In fact, many participants were shocked by this borrowed benefit, as one attendee put it.

I wasn't expecting anything personally from this and was blissfully surprised, said Joey from Y Kat's Organ, said Joey from Y Kat's organ about his improved relationships. This ecstatic state seemed to be so powerful that it opened the possibility of individual miracles, healed relationships, major life transformations, and healed lives. Sending intention for peace seemed to have instigated some rebound effect so that a greater sense of peacefulness infiltrated their lives.

Thank you for listening, and thank yourself for taking five minutes of peace. We are all connected on a path of love, service, and...