Dear ,
I hope you are well. It’s been snowing quite a lot in Manchester over the last couple of days and everything looks beautiful, with
the sun shining down from a perfect blue sky. It’s cold but invigorating, and I’ve been enjoying some snowball fights with my kids, and we started to build a snowman before young Bill went to school. One thing I love when it snows is looking up to the sky and seeing the millions of snowdrops stretching infinitely into the air. It’s hypnotic - you feel almost as if you are dissolving into the endless flurry of snow.
I was going to try to send this out as a February newsletter, but realised that I was going to be a bit late - so here is a March newsletter instead! In any case, it seems more positive and appropriate to send a newsletter out at the beginning of a month, rather than the end. So from now on, I will aim to send out my newsletter in the first week of each
month.
Ireland
The week before last I was in
Ireland. I gave a talk in Dublin and we stayed there for three nights. The talk was very enjoyable, with a wonderful peaceful atmosphere, and I met a lot of lovely spiritually developed people. I also climbed a small mountain (Sugarloaf, in Co. Wicklow) with my kids and wandered the streets and sights of Dublin City. I feel very at home in Ireland - maybe because I have some Irish ancestry, or (more likely) because the people and the landscape feel so warm and welcoming. I had the impression
(which I've had before) that Ireland is very progressive and open to spirituality and that spiritual evolution is happening a little more quickly there than elsewhere. Irish people seem to be very quickly moving beyond the restrictions of tradition and history and embracing a new future, including spiritual development.
I was disappointed
last year when the British people voted to leave the European Union. I see it as a backward step, against the tide of history, based on xenophobia and pipe dreams of an illusory better future. But I recently found that there is a way for me personally to stay in the EU. Since one of my grandparents was Irish, I am entitled to become an Irish citizen! So that could be a possibility in the future. Ireland would certainly be a beautiful place to live. The 'Taylor-Hartelius Debate on Religion and Spirituality'
In case you don’t know, I have
a three-day-a-week role as a psychologist at a university, where I’m involved in a field called ‘transpersonal psychology,’ which really means ‘spiritual psychology.’ It’s the field of psychology which investigates spirituality - spiritual experiences, spiritual transformation, spiritual traditions, and so on. In recent months, I've taken part in a debate with Glenn Hartelius - a prominent transpersonal psychologist - about spirituality and its relationship to psychology, which has just been
published in the International Journal of Transpersonal Studies. This has been one of my main projects over the last year or so. It started with a paper called ‘From Philosophy to Phenomenology: The Argument for a Soft Perennialism.’ I was defending the idea that there is a common spirituality that lies behind all different spiritual traditions, and opposing the idea that transpersonal psychology should be a 'science' which doesn't deal with philosophical issues or spiritual states of being.
Glenn Hartelius was critical of this, believing that you can’t be a psychologist at the same as promoting a spiritual vision of the world. So this led to a debate about these issues, and about what transpersonal psychology is, or should be.
You can read the dialogue here. If you scroll down, you will find three papers of mine, with response from Hartelius. At the beginning of February our cat Mitzi died unexpectedly. It seems as if she had a stroke. We were all very upset, especially Bill and Ted (my two young boys). The house feels very empty
without her. It’s strange how her quiet and unobtrusive presence filled the whole house. It was like a background against which we lived our lives. So all best wishes and blessings to Mitzi, on her onward journey - wherever the consciousness of a cat goes when it’s no longer associated with their bodily form! I used to marvel
at Mitzi’s ability to be still - to rest for hours in zen-like calm. I wrote these lines inspired by her a few months ago: If only (to Mitzi) If only human
beings could sit like cats
in perfect oneness with themselves
and with the space they occupy
with no need to do or to be elsewhere. If only human beings could wait like cats
suspended outside time
and not a single thought of the future
to fill them with frustration
content to be, or to be
nothing
until time begins again. Savor this World, Savor this
Life A few days ago, I had an e-mail from a person who asked me if I was the author of a poem called ‘Savor this World, Savor this Life.’ She said she had been at
a memorial service the previous day, where it had been read out, and she had found it very moving. How beautiful and touching to think that one of my poems was read out at a memorial service! I think that’s the greatest honour I could possibly have as an author.
If you don’t
know it, it’s one of my pieces from ‘The Calm Center.’ It was one of my personal favourites too, so I’ll include it here. It’s a reminder to celebrate the wonder and beauty of our transient existence in this world. There may be another life and another world beyond this one - but we’re only able to experience this world in this form for a certain amount of time.
Savor this world
because your ship only landed here by chance
on the shore of this strange island
in the middle of an empty ocean
and you can only stay here for a while
wandering these lush forests
eating these exotic
fruits
until your ship sets sail again.
Savor this world
because you’re only a guest passing through this town
stopping off to visit some relatives on your way back home
not long enough to put down any roots
walking these foreign streets
nodding at passers-by — the locals, you presume.
But look more closely — everyone’s a traveller here.
Savor this life
because it’s passing away like a fast-flowing river
and there’s nothing to hold on to
no branches overhead to grasp
no bushes by your side to catch —
nothing to do but to swim with the flow
and lose yourself
in the roar and the rhythm and the rush.
Savor this life
because you’ve won the greatest prize
the freedom of the city
the keys to the kingdom
a lifelong cruise through time and space
the honor of experience
the accolade of existence.
And one day you’ll have to give it back.
And when that day comes you won’t feel any bitterness
only gratitude for the privilege of being
as long you have lived in celebration
as long you have lived in appreciation
as long as you have savored the world.
All best wishes, Steve
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