I’ve seen the patterns of war repeat themselves across cultures, borders, and decades.

This is not a political post. It’s a leadership one. A human one.

We cannot keep watching history rewrite itself while acting surprised.

I was raised in the shadow of war.

Not the kind you read in textbooks or watch from a safe distance, but the kind that teaches you to recognize the smell of fear before breakfast.

That trains you to listen not just to what leaders say, but to the silence that follows.

Today, I see the same pattern playing out again. Only the names change. The suffering does not.

In just the past three weeks, the world has reignited old fires :

- Iran and Israel exchanging strikes.

- India and Pakistan tightening their lines.

- Russia and Ukraine locked in attrition.

- And across the African continent, wars that never made the headlines continue to devastate.

- Sudan. Mali. Congo. Somalia. No declarations. No front pages. Just the slow, silent erosion of life, where a battlefield is often a woman's body or a child's future.

We call them “conflicts.”

But!!

let’s speak honestly:

They are symptoms of decayed power structures, political arrogance, and the global community’s willingness to look away.

Let me save you time: I already know how this ends.

− The media will frame it.

− The powerful will spin it.

− The innocent will bury their dead.

− And the architects of the violence will watch it all from a safe distance and then write the history!!

But here’s what they will not write:

We are not born enemies. We are made that way. And what is made can be unmade.

Some of us were born in war, but we were never born for it.

I’ve seen borders drawn in blood, but I still believe in the quiet rebellion of peace.

Because peace is not weakness.

War is.

This is not about politics. It is about souls intertwined. Human hearts, beating as ONE. It is about you, your kin, your companions. It is about my lineage, my tribe, my cherished ones, and myself.

It envelops us all.

If you feel the urge to choose a side, choose humanity. Stand for dignity. Defend truth. Support life, even when it's unpopular to do so.

And if you’re neutral in the face of injustice, don’t mistake that for professionalism.

It’s passivity. And passivity costs lives.

Sometimes, refusing to see the world in lines, flags, and factions is the only way to stay human in a world constantly dividing itself.

We were not created to inherit other people’s wars. We were born to break the cycle. We can’t afford to unsee this.

Not again.

Mary Shepherd Ph.D.

Human Systems Psychologist | Culture Architect

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