Being a spiritual seeker eventually led me to Engaged Buddhism. Here is the story of that journey in four parts.
Experiences that lead me to believe God is nature (Spinoza)
My early experiences of this were through the sublime, that is, the awe inspiring, and where what significance transcends the signification of its label. The first time I experienced this I was lost in a cave and coming out it as if I had forgotten how extraordinarily the sky was. I also experienced this uncontainable beauty in the Sinai desert, in the morning and evening light on a Wadi, or occasionally on top of high fell in the lake district and feeling one with enormity of space and time.
The dawning realisation that my force of will (ego) is quite distinct from my spiritual power
Much of my life has been dominated by what I wanted, what I believed I have been entitled to through my work and sheer effort. A great example is my life as an academic, where I kept wanting more recognition, more qualifications, more prestigious grants and publications. Life as an academic was a self-made project of continual achievement.
This achieving part – the big I am – has at times been insatiable and has had to be balanced by a more spiritual part that is able to connect to the present moment and accept it as it is. This is it! I first recognised this as a spiritual healer.
Spiritual healing is a power that connects and never a force that wills. I found out that spiritual healing happens if you (i.e. your ego) gets out of its own way. I have come to recognise that this is a power that only exists in the present moment, and that not only do you need to be mindful but also open to a surrendering to a higher power. In material sense this higher power is an interconnected energy field where healing happens and, in spite of any deeply held hope for an outcome, healing is happening through guidance rather than will.
The most profound healing I have ever had was in the bush in middle of Brazil by a well-known trans-medium. Shortly after the healing, I became hugely spacious and part of the everything around me. In that moment I had transcended the boundaries of my physical body – I hadn’t lost awareness but felt integrated and spaciously one with everything around me. It was a blissfully peaceful non-dual state that for a while vanquished any shadow of a doubt of who I thought I was.
Finding my spiritual home
If in Brazil, I’d accidentally felt this awesome interconnectedness by receiving a healing, in Plum Village, I discovered how inter-being could be realised through mindful walking mediation. In 2014 on a summer retreat in Plum Village, led by Thich Nhat Hanh, I truly arrived and found my home.
Walking meditation in the beautiful grounds of Plum Village I understood what it was like to be organism: a cell in the sangha body, which, in turn, is a cell the Buddha body. I dropped superiority, inferiority and equality complexes and for a-while and deeply felt what it was like to be with other beings and go as a river.
The Order of Inter-Being and the Bodhisattva vow.
Iris Murdoch said that ‘love is the difficult realisation that someone other than you is real.’
I have a deeper understanding what she meant since committing to the Bodhisattva path i.e. someone who is not just concerned for the alleviation of their own suffering and attainment personal enlightenment, but is there for the enlightenment and suffering of others.
In 2022, I ordained in the order of Inter being (the OI). The OI is part of the fourfold sangha – made up of male and female members of the monastic and lay community at Plum village who have committed their lives in accord to the fourteen mindfulness trainings. This is a global spiritual ethic, which is a distillation of the Bodhisattva teachings in the Mahayana tradition. The OI has its roots in the social and political activism of the Vietnam war and was founded in 1966 by Thich Nhat Hanh.
Joining the OI helped make sense of my past activism, where I was involved in non-violent action actions to alleviate and transform the suffering of people with suicidal ideation, dementia and people who are homeless. It has helped me in acting as a natural ambassador, where I was tasked to use non-violent communication strategies to change people’s perceptions to wading bird disturbances in Morecambe bay. Also, it has helped me in being a cat fosterer and taking in stressed cats, rehabilitating them and letting them go once they’ve found their forever home/owner.
The OI has also given me a renewed and deeper focus. I recently worked with people with addiction issues through mindful walking and sharing, which I now also practice in Prisons, extending this to range of other Buddhist practices I offer as a sessional Buddhist Chaplain.