2026 season for nonviolence concludes

When I began this lengthy series, I knew from decades of yoga and meditation retreats what I was stepping into.

I was committing to all the challenges of an intensive daily practice — of maintaining attention over time, and of meeting ahimsa not as an idea, but as something alive in my mind, my body, and the world around me. 

I wanted to explore it with the depth and nuance laid out by the Mahatma Gandhi Foundation. To question it. To be shaped by it. And however imperfectly, to complete the framework of prompts in a way that felt authentic to my own contemplative and creative practice.

Each post became a doorway to enter that practice more fully through my chosen mediums: origami and writing — to make gentle, respectful contact with lived experience and reflect on it in a way that embodied the values of nonviolence.

For me, origami and writing were never just tools to make art. They were the art itself.

Each fold needed presence.
Each word required honesty.

Together, they became a way of thinking, feeling, and responding — one small, deliberate act at a time.

There is a quote often attributed to Mahatma Gandhi: “There is no way to peace, peace is the way.”

In the unfolding of this series, I felt the echo of that truth in my own practice.

There was no point at which I would arrive at a perfect origami model or a perfect understanding of ahimsa.

The folding was the understanding.
The writing was the understanding.

Not completely, but sincerely. And that sincerity mattered.

Over these 64 days, I wasn’t just completing posts. I was staying in relationship — with the 64 attributes of nonviolence, with the discipline of daily attention, and with noticing how these qualities live (or don’t yet live) in me and around me.

There were many moments that felt uncannily aligned with my personal life and the wider world. I could have written an entire second journal just tracing those connections!

There is more here, I can feel it — threads worth following, patterns worth gathering, a deeper harvest waiting within the field and fodder of all those images and reflections, and the ones that didn't get picked this time around.

But for now, I want to pause.

To celebrate not just that I completed this series, but how I completed it:

With intention.
With consistency.
With curiosity.

With joyful enthusiasm and a willingness to let the practice itself be both anchor and inquiry.

I set out to explore ahimsa through origami and writing. In doing so, I found myself more fully in resonance with both. Not as a means to an end, but as my own way of being.

Thank you for the framework, Mahatma Gandhi Foundation of Canada. I look forward to returning to this.

For now, I fold this season closed the same way I began it — attentively, curiously, and with deep respect for what can emerge when we meet even the simplest and most common moments and materials with care.

day 64 - celebration

Celebration doesn't have to be loud to be meaningful. It can be as simple as pausing with wonder at how far you've come.

Celebrating wins builds momentum, boosts confidence and fosters gratitude, acknowledging that small steps can lead to big achievements.

Today I'm celebrating by looking back at all the posts in this series and marvelling at all I've learned, all I've folded, and how much I've enjoyed the process.

Today, I feel like a winner. 

Thank you for helping me make the Season for Nonviolence 2026 something to cheer about!

Penguin designed by Gay Merrill Gross

day 63 - release

"The greatest effort is not the fight, it's the letting go." 

- Rumi 

Release is how nonviolence becomes possible. When I loosen my grip, on anger, on fear, on control, I create space for gentler choices. 

Release interrupts the chain; it defuses tension before it turns into harm.

This little cat, eyes closed and body at ease, reminds me that inner peace often begins with a simple exhale. He is a tiny embodiment of de-escalation, a playful little being teaching a serious truth — that harm often comes from what we hold too tightly.

Today I'm practicing release, beginning in my body, by consciously tensing and relaxing my muscles.

Cat designed and taught by origami_ishibashinaoko on YouTube

day 62 - commitment

"Fall down seven times, get up eight." 

- Daruma

Commitment isn't necessarily proven by the performance of intensity. 

It is demonstrated by tenacious determination — returning to the task over and over again.

Today I'm practicing commitment by keeping this promise to myself.

Want to make your own commitment? Fold a Daruma doll with this video from Kamikey Origami

day 61 - peace

"I will write peace on your wings and fly you around the world." 

- Sadako Sasaki

Peace, like balance, isn't something I arrive at once and for all. It's something I calibrate constantly in subtle, persistent gestures. 

Just as a bird needs two wings to fly, that calibration requires the coordinated effort of love and wisdom — and as this Season for Nonviolence has shown me in depth and nuance, so much more. 

Today I'm practicing peace by adapting, adjusting, and accommodating.

day 60 - witnessing

"The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command." 

- George Orwell, 1984

Witnessing goes beyond seeing. It asks me to stand firmly present in a moment — joyful or uncomfortable.

It asks that I remember, honor, and perhaps even speak on behalf of what deserves to be acknowledged or what must not be forgotten. 

Today I'm practicing witnessing by staying rooted — to expose and humanize truth, and also to rejoice in the astounding unfolding of life.

Ema by hiroko_daichan origami and tree by origaminojikan, both on YouTube

day 59 - intervention

Origami embodies nonviolence through intervention. 

It's a gentle, intentional art that changes something — a piece of paper, a mood, a mind, a space — without aggression. 

It can take grand forms, like the 1000 cranes installations in Hiroshima, displayed in a public memorial space dedicated to honoring and healing, inspiring reflection and solidarity.  

But it can also be:

Symbolic: Folded hearts or flowers left in public spaces for people to find, or community garlands made for a cause.

Environmental: Transforming waste materials into decorative or useful objects, or using compostable and recycled materials as an intervention against overconsumption.

Personal/Mindful: Origami can interrupt spirals of stress. Each deliberate fold is a mini-training in nonviolent, thoughtful intervention.

Social: Origami fosters connection, cooperation, empathy and communication. It can express care or solidarity when words fall short.

Today I'm practicing intervention by letting the deliberate, mindful, act of folding shift my own mental state.

day 58 - citizenship

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." 

- Margaret Mead

How we approach citizenship is how we share space, handle conflict, and shape what we all live with. 

To that end, nonviolence isn’t necessarily avoiding disagreement. Often, it's finding ways of changing things in ways that don’t destroy the people and systems we will still be in relationship with after.

Similarly, when I fold, I can’t force the paper without weakening it. I have to work with the constraints of the pattern and material limits. 

Respect them, and my actions support a beautiful end result. Disregard them, and both the form and the pleasure fail.

You could say life comes to us “pre-folded” with our country's unique history, laws, and tensions — we don’t start with a blank sheet. As such, if citizenship is our part in the shared shape of things, nonviolence is how we change that shape without breaking it. 

Today I'm practicing nonviolent citizenship by attending to the way I participate when there is disagreement in my community.

day 57 - service

An umbrella can provide shelter from the rain — it can also block out the sun.

The same object, the same gesture — helpful or harmful depending on what is actually needed.

In nonviolence, service isn't about rushing in to provide what makes me feel useful, it's more like attending to the changing weather of someone else's life. 

Sometimes a person, or a situation, needs cover. Sometimes they need warmth, light, and space. If I open the umbrella without really paying attention, I might protect or I might dim what's helping them grow.

Service needs to be responsive, attentive to the moment and the person standing in it.

Today I'm practicing asking what's needed before offering solutions.

Umbrella by origaminojikan on YouTube

day 56 - self-sufficiency

"Do what you can, with what you have, where you are."

- Theodore Roosevelt

Self-sufficiency is providing for myself, and trusting that I can work with what I have.

I have folded the masu box so many times I know the sequence by heart. Still, it never ceases to amaze me. 

The folding pleases me because it feels so elegant and efficient. 

Plus, the uses are practically endless — from biodegradable bone-catchers destined for the compost bin on wing night, to pretty desk organizers and gift boxes, I can no longer imagine my life without knowing how to make these. 

There's a quiet confidence in knowing that I can turn almost nothing into something useful — that I can meet a small, real need with my own hands, and that I have the ability to customize the measure of what that needs to be.

The paper I chose for this box features the traditional Asanoha pattern which represents the hemp leaf: vigorous, resilient and able to meet a multitude of human needs.

Today I'm practicing self-sufficiency by affirming: I can produce what I need, measure what is enough, and carry it myself.

day 55 - responsibility

"There is fortune in leftovers." 

- Japanese Saying

Responsibility starts with stewardship — recognizing what is and isn't mine to carry. 

This little pouch, called a Fukubukuro or Lucky Bag feels like a symbol of what I hold: choices, responses, care, and consequences.

Today I'm practicing responsibility by asking myself two questions: 

When I'm "left holding the bag," what happens to my compassion? 

And "What have I been entrusted with, by choice or by circumstance, and how do I want to carry it?"

day 54 - giving

"It's not how much we give but how much love we put into giving."

- Mother Teresa

Giving is about what leaves my hands. It's also about the attention I bring to the offering.

This pretty box was folded for a celebration and will hold something small but meaningful. It has been lovingly shaped to honor both what's inside, and my esteem for the receiver. 

Today I'm practicing giving by reflecting on what it means to wrap something — an object, a moment, or even a feeling — with care.

day 53 - action

"We are clearly in a lot of emergencies right now. They demand action. But action demands thought and thoughtfulness: who are we, what are our values, our goals, our allies, our possibilities, and our powers?"

- Rebecca Solnit 

In my origami practice, the action begins the moment I stop deliberating and start making thoughtful decisions. 

This little heart, folded from a dictionary page, started as a way to use up a scrap of paper.  But when I finished and saw the word pulse on it's surface I felt like it was also a message to my Self: action is the heartbeat of nonviolence.

I started to think about all the ways nonviolent action is like a pulse: 

• It animates values, making them circulatory rather than theoretical.
• It's rhythmic, moving in waves of pressure and pause.
• It is a repetition of persistent gestures, not one big event, keeping a body, a community, a system alive.
• It carries life to the edges, moving blood where it's needed just as action mobilizes care, attention, resources and pressure to areas that have been starved of them.
• It responds to stress, it adapts to crisis by intensifying.
• It is a sign that the body — or a society — is active, alive and evolving.
• And if it stops, something is wrong.

Today I'm practicing action by letting the answers to these questions guide my choices and evolution: Who am I, what are my values, goals, allies, possibilities, and powers?

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day 52 - equality

In modular origami, equality isn't an idea — it's a requirement. It's material and measurable. 

When folding modular or symmetrical forms, the beauty comes from balance. 

Every module has to start out exactly the same size, be folded with the same precision, given the same care. If I rush one unit, the whole structure tells on me. 

Equality here shows up as patience, as repetition, as willingness to offer the same respect again and again. 

The challenge is consistency; the delight is when the whole becomes visibly balanced.

Today, I'm practicing equality, in origami and in life, by meeting repetitive tasks with curiosity and patience.

Illusion cubes designed by David Mitchell. Published in his book, Sticky Note Origami.

day 51 - advocacy

Advocacy isn’t necessarily noisy. It can be a quiet acknowledgement of something noteworthy. 

Take this note pad sheet folded into a speech bubble. It isn’t shouting. It’s held open for something kind or helpful to be said.

When I fold, I practice care for attention itself. I make something slow in a fast world, tactile in a complex one. 

When I speak about it, it’s not to assert or assign — it’s to say: this has given me focus and joy, maybe it could for you too.

The nonviolence aspect here is deliberate. Choosing words the way I choose folds: on a good day, that means with patience, respect, and an eye toward what could become without being forced.

This is soft advocacy, certainly. Not a push, but an invitation. Not a demand, but a demonstration. 

Because some things don’t need defending. It's enough to make them visible, and trust them to speak for themselves.

Today, my practice of advocacy includes inviting, tending, making space, and letting people discover what fits.

Speech Bubble designed and taught by Kamikey on YouTube

day 50 - choice

"May your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears." 

- Nelson Mandela

Choice shows up even in the most structured moments. In origami, every fold is a decision: this way or that.

This traditional masu box has a divider insert folded from a separate square of atlas paper, making it a perfect vessel for presenting a variety of treats or cherishing a collection.

What would you choose to fill it with?

Today, I’m practicing choice by noticing the direction I take — and why.

day 49 - honour

“The way you do anything is the way you do everything.”

- Thich Nhat Hanh

Honor in origami is how I treat what’s been entrusted to me.

Every choice — the paper, the pattern, the folds, the time — matters. 

Each square, each hand that will receive it, each minute spent folding is part of the offering.

Today, I’m practicing honor by giving this practice—and the sharing of it—the care, gratitude, and attention it deserves.

day 48 - ecology

"The way we see the world shapes the way we treat it." 

- David Suzuki

Ecology reminds us: nothing exists alone. We’re part of a vast, buzzing web.

I recently learned that flies aren’t just clean-up crews — they’re pollinators too. Apples, grapes, even hops for your beer? Thank a fly.

Today, I’m practicing ecology by noticing the world from a different perspective.

Fly: Leyla Torres, Origami Spirit

day 47 - disarmament

Disarmament isn’t just about drones and bombs — it’s also un-clenching my heart and hands.

Today, I’m practicing disarmament by choosing care over combat, gentleness over guardedness… and raising a folded paw instead of a claw.

Kitty and basket designed and taught by origami_ishibashinaoko on YouTube.

day 46 - compassion

"One love, one heart" 

- Bob Marley

Those words feel like the perfect companion for this folded heart today.

Visually, this heart is two halves not quite meeting in the middle, holding tenderness even when things are cracked or split.

Compassion is like that. Not shiny or perfect, but steady, warm, and willing to frame what’s fragile. It is the quiet work of helping the two halves of the heart — or two people — find their way a little closer together.

My blog name, One Love Origami, was inspired by this song. At the time it simply felt good and sounded beautiful to me.

Over the years I’ve come to see not only how creative expression can help mend a broken heart, but also how beautifully folding paper brings people together across languages, cultures, and differences. It generously and inclusively extends an invitation, much like the song: “Let’s get together and feel alright.”

Today I'm practicing compassion by meeting my own missteps with kindness — noticing my inner critic and softening its tendency toward prosecution, practicing a little non-violence toward myself so that I can also meet the world with more love.

Heart designed by Fumiaki Shingu
Frame designed by Kamikey