Dear ,
I hope you are well. As usual, I’m rather late sending out my monthly newsletter. It should arrive with you on April 30th - which is
actually my birthday. This year it’s quite a significant birthday too - one with a ‘0’ at the end. Oh okay…I will be 50 years old. I don’t pay much attention to birthdays, and usually barely celebrate them, but I guess 50 deserves a bit of celebration. The idea of being 50 seems a little strange as I still feel very young. I still feel that life is very new, and that things are just beginning. I feel that there’s so much more to explore and discover. I feel almost as if I’m being newly born all
the time. The world is such a fascinating and beautiful place and life is such a strange and interesting process…That’s why I sometimes say that I don’t understand boredom, and can truthfully say that I’ve never ever been bored.
I also feel very grateful that I’ve made it to 50. Like most of us, I’ve had a few close brushes with death in my
lifetime, and I know that there are many people in the world - and billions more throughout history - who don’t and didn’t make it this far due to poverty and war and disease. If I’d been born at any time before the 20th century, and if I happened to live in a different part of the world now, there’s a very strong possibility that I wouldn’t live to the age of 50. In the city were I live, Manchester, during the 19th century around half of all children died before reaching adulthood. Most of my
ancestors were millworkers and factory workers and miners who lived in poverty and had short life expectancies. So how could I possibly complain about anything? (If you have a copy of my book The Meaning, that’s what my poem ‘I Am One of the Free’ is about). The Leap
Last month I said that March was the month of The Leap. April has been
another month of the book. The book seems to have struck a chord with a lot of people, particularly in the US, and I’m continuing to get a lot of requests for radio interviews. It’s quite hard work, as a lot of them are pod-casts which are an hour long, but it’s great to create some interest and to have the opportunity to communicate my ideas and feelings.
I’m also getting a lot of e-mails about the book. I always try to respond to e-mails - especially as I can remember how delighted I always was (and continue to be) with responses from my favourite authors - but it’s becoming a little problematic because of the amount of time it takes up. I think the solution is to create a duplicate version of myself - perhaps using the latest brain scanning and mind-downloading technology - who can handle all the radio interviews and e-mails
while I get on with writing my next book and teaching at my university. It could be expensive, but if the book does become a best-seller and I’m invited on to Oprah Winfrey’s show, then I might be able to afford it.
You can listen to one of my recent radio interviews online, this one is with Paul Samuel Dolman.
Also, here is a video of a talk I recently gave about the book at Watkins Bookshop in London. I love going to Watkins, as it’s one of the oldest bookshops in London and is filled with thousands of esoteric and spiritual tomes which I could never read even if there were a hundred duplicate versions of myself.
New Book On the
subject of writing a new book, maybe you could help me out. I have two books I could approach a publisher with next. One is a book of new poetic reflections, possibility called 'The Flow' or 'The Wave.’ I have around 60 new poems/reflections, some of which I’m very pleased with. I’ve developed a slightly different style since The Calm Center, and I think my new pieces could con situate an excellent new inspirational text. The other is a prose book called Spiritual Science - Beyond
Materialism, towards a new vision of reality. It's about how a spiritual or panpsychist vision of the world can explain a lot of the things that conventional science tries to explain but can't, such as consciousness, altruism, near-death experiences, telepathy etc.
I can't decide which one to offer to a publisher. I asked my
intuition and it said, 'ask the people who receive your monthly newsletter'. Let me know on [email protected]. Talks In Manchester and Grimsby
On Tuesday May 2nd, I’m taking a two hour train journey to speak in Grimsby, at the Grimsby Institute. This is a two hour talk/session on ‘The Psychology of Spiritual Awakening.’ I’ll be including some poems and meditative exercises, and it’s free! For more information or to reserve a place, see the event page.
On May 25th I’m also giving a talk on ‘The Psychology of
Spiritual Awakening’ in Totnes, Devon, at the Consciousness Cafe. You can find further information their website. New Poems and Meditations On-Line One new thing I’ve been doing recently is recording some of my poems and some of the meditations I’ve developed at workshops and talks over the years. These have been appearing on the popular meditation site Insight Timer. To find my meditations, you need to click on
‘teachers’ and enter my name into search. New Research Project Finally, I have begun a new research project on transformational experiences - or spiritual awakenings - associated with bereavement. The question we’ve been asking people is “Has a
bereavement brought about a profound and permanent shift in the way that you see the world, live your life and relate to other people? Has the bereavement brought a new spirituality and sense of meaning into your life?' If that applies to you, and you think you might be interested in taking part in the research, please reply to [email protected].
Anyway, now I’d better go and start getting ready for my birthday celebrations…Only joking! I’m not really one for parties, as I’m very sensitive to noise and crowds. I feel disoriented after a few minutes in a large group of people. I will celebrate quietly - as I celebrate every day, but perhaps a little more.
All best wishes, Steve |
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