The World in a Sentence

by Sue Williams

“Once in a while, someone says something that stops me in my tracks. Their words seem to encapsulate a truth, showing me a life very different from mine, or perhaps an idea new to me, an insight, or something we unexpectedly share. That truth seems to expand, in somewhat the same way that poetry expands, as we add imagination, empathy, experience. It seems to invite me in.”

Sue Williams shares stories of words that have opened up new insights to her from her more than thirty years of peacebuilding work around the world.

Pendle Hill Pamphlet #486

32 pages, Kindle Edition

Published April 4, 2024

About the author

There is more than one author with this name

Reviews

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author has had a wealth of unique experiences helping find peace within communities across the globe where peoples' differences have risen to conflict and violence. During the decades of work, she and her husband were shaken back to a level of humanity that is lacking in most everyone's experience, regardless of where they are and the challenges they face by a few unexpected words uttered by unexpected sources at unexpected times. Each of them brought Williams back to her being, she caught her breath, was speechless or motionless or awakened by the utterances.

Some will connect to particular readers more than others. I wouldn't be surprised if some have move meaning at different points of one's life than others.

For me, the opening statement about someone looking at another as if they were really there, was particularly chilling or cutting, because of an experience on my street a short time before reading it where a person living rough was put off by another person not having the time to hear their story or spiel (depending on one's attitude toward panhandling) to try to gain a coin. The person living rough said something like "you don't even have the time to listen" as the person continued walking.

Williams book and that opening vignette developed from one comment, had me rethinking over and over the incident I witnessed. What was truth? What was right? Williams story was about a person being one of the token blacks/whites/asians/etc in a community. They were made invisible by their difference. Was it similar in the case I witnessed? Was one person invisible because the other didn't want to face the reality? Or did the other have a suspected notion of how their dollar might be spent should they give it to the person loitering outside the state liquor store? Should it matter how the dollar might be given if one can afford to part with it, particularly if they have no clue of their presupposition is entirely wrong?

So this was an good read for a midweek reminder of our need to adopt roles with others, stripped of the trappings of our pre-drawn conclusions, prejudices, and need for feeling superior. A worthy read.

[Mary Helene · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's a few sentences, it quite powerful in it's description of people leaning into non-violence. It's a brief evening's read, but I don't think I will be the same after that evening.