Lockdown, The Moon and New Articles

Published: Sun, 05/24/20

Steve Taylor's May Newsletter

Dear

I hope you are well well and haven’t been too badly affected or inconvenienced by the coronavirus and the lockdown. Here in the UK we’ve been in lockdown for about 8 weeks now. Life is very quiet and slow and I can feel the quietness and slowness enriching me. It feels a little like a spiritual retreat. Obviously my kids aren’t at school, but they are being set school work to do so I've taken a part-time role as a teacher, although at the moment we’re only doing a couple of hours of schoolwork per day. We are going for a lot of bike rides and playing a lot of football and other games on the park.

Despite the devastation it has caused to many people, I am sure that the virus and lockdown will have some positive effects, as suggested in my piece in Scientific American last month. I recently wrote another piece for The Conversation website, about the transformational aspects of the situation, and how we can harness them. You can read it here.

New Academic Papers

My new academic paper on 'Time Expansion Experiences' has just been published in the Journal of Humanistic Psychology. It was a really interesting research project and has reawakened my interest in the topic of time. I'm thinking of writing a new book based on the research. I also like coining new terms and acronyms and I think TEE is a good one.

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0022167820917484

I’ve also had a paper called ‘Transformation through Loss and Grief’ published in another journal. This was a study I did on 16 people who had experienced spiritual awakening after the death of loved ones. I have found in my research that bereavement is one of the most powerful triggers of spiritual awakening, so it was really interesting to investigate these cases in more detail.

https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2020-20322-001

If you would like to read either (or both) of these papers, drop me a line in response to this email and I will send you them.

Extraordinary Awakenings

During the lockdown I’ve been going deep into my new book and have written about two-thirds of it. I originally wanted to call it Extraordinary Awakenings but I’m thinking of changing it to The Miracle or The Shifters. It’s about people who undergo a sudden (or sometimes gradual) spiritual awakening in situations of extreme adversity. The miracle is the sudden emergence of new self from the ashes of the old ego, which dissolves away in the face of extreme adversity. The Shifters are the people who undergo this shift. Do you think The Miracle or The Shifters would work as a title? The subtitle would probably be ‘Transformation at the Extremes of Human Suffering.’

A couple of weeks ago I was about to start writing Chapter 6, which is about transformation through encountering death. Last year I was sent this wonderful excerpt from an interview with the Indian actor Irrfan Khan, when he was first diagnosed with cancer:

'There's no guarantee of life with anybody. My mind could always tell me, "I have this disease and I could die in a few months or a year or two." Or I could just avoid this conversation completely and live my life the way it offers me. I admit I was walking around with blinders. I couldn't see what life offered me. Clarity came like lightning. You stop your contemplation, you stop your planning, you stop the noise. You see the other aspect of it. It gives you so much. Life offers you so much. That's why I feel like I have no other words but thanks. There are no other words, there's no other demand, there's no other prayer.'

I loved the passage and had saved it in my notes for my new book, to include in Chapter 6. The same morning I intended to start the chapter, I heard the news that Irrfan Khan had died of his illness, at the age of 53. It seemed an uncanny coincidence. It's very sad that he has passed on, but also a blessing that he was able to experience that heightened awareness and higher-functioning state during the last phase of his life.

Kindred Spirit Awards

The UK spirituality magazine Kindred Spirit has kindly included me in its annual awards. You can see further details (and even cast a vote) here: https://kindredspirit.co.uk/ksawards

Events

I obviously don’t have any physical events at the moment, but I have a couple of free online events coming up.

On Thursday 28th May, I’m discussing ‘The Pandemic as Spiritual Emergency’ in a talk with the American Association for the Study of Spiritually Transformative Experiences. You can register here

On 2nd June, I’m taking part in an online evening conference on “Corona and Beyond: Transiting to a New Paradigm’ organized through the Alef Trust. Register here

Haircut

Haircuts during the lockdown are problematic. My wife Pam has cut my hair, without any previous hairdressing experience. She has also cut our three sons’ hair as well. I think she has done a great job! I'm hoping that she'll carry on doing it even when the barbers' shops open again

New Poem

My 10 year old son Bill loves astronomy and has been asking for a telescope for a while so we decided that the lockdown was a good time to buy one. So a few weeks ago I saw the moon through the telescope for the first time. I can't describe how amazing it is, to see its beautiful luminous craggy surface in such detail from 250.000 miles way. I was totally stunned. It made me realise that all through my life I've taken the moon for granted, never really been aware of its reality and beauty. Never again! It's made feel so uplifted to feel that there is such an enormous beautiful entity up in the sky above us, always available for us to peruse! So I decided to write a poem about the experience:

Hymn to the Moon (After Looking At the Moon through A Telescope for the First Time

Oh moon - I have known you all my life.
When I was a child, in the back of my father’s car
you followed me around every corner
played and hide seek behind every tree
and raced behind every cloud to keep on my trail.

I've sent my greetings to you countless times
on winter nights when you seemed frozen solid
sending icy white light down from high above
or on summer nights when you were gold and luminous
hovering so close you seemed to kiss the earth.

But now I realise that I’ve never really known you.
Now I’m stunned by your silver radiance
by your pure translucent beauty
and the infinite intricate details
of your craggy contours and craters
and your bruised and cracked pale landscapes
and your endless shades of white and grey
and the frozen explosions of trails and points
that stream across your surface.

I never dreamed that your luminous silver face
carried so much character.
I never realised that your giant rocky mass
rested in such stillness.

It’s as if there was a girl at school
who sat quietly at the back of the class
and bowed her head shyly as she walked by
so that I scarcely paid attention to her.

Then years later I encounter her
and I’m mesmerised by her beauty
and stunned by the radiance of her being.

And then I fall in love with her.

Oh beautiful luminous lady
I will never take you for granted again.
As I live on the surface of my planet
I will always be aware of your presence
always sense your massive majestic form
hovering benignly above me
showering me with white radiance.

My world will be never be the same again.
I will always be in love.

All best wishes and blessings, Steve