Power.

When you find an animal dying slowly and painfully, what do you do?

I killed a puppy with my bare hands.
The single toughest thing I've ever done - physically and emotionally. I don't think that I regret it, but at the same time, I'm not sure I did the right thing (is there ever a right thing to do?). Nor am I sure quite what I learnt from the experience.


I think the truth is: I'm still learning from it...


When I was 9 or 10 years old we went on holiday. I don’t remember how old I was exactly, but I can’t have been more than 10, because my brother wasn’t born yet.

While we were out walking one day our dog, Rocky, caught a rabbit. He held it in his jaws, shook it from side to side, and then dropped it. It fell like a rag doll, and Rocky went on his way again: job done.

My parents also started off again, but I couldn’t leave the rabbit like that: its neck was broken, but it was alive. It was still breathing (very fast) and was clearly conscious.

So I took a large rock, and killed it, as fast as I could. 

I remember my parents being very impressed. But the truth is, I just couldn’t leave it like that. I didn’t feel I had a choice.

Fastforward almost 20 years.

My wife told me to edit this (too graphic). I didn’t – read at your own discretion.

I had a miserable childhood.

Don’t get me wrong: I was blessed with great parents who gave me very strong foundations. But beyond that, I got a fairly tough deal.

Each and every school I went to sucked. Sucked with a capital S.

Strange really because they were all private schools; or as we say in England (in a typically counter-intuitive, oxymoronic kind of a way), public schools. The schools that parents have to pay a lot of money to send their kids to.

So I supposedly had one of the best educations that money can buy! Sure didn’t feel like it though… and I suspect that education is not something that can, or should be, bought…

***

When I was six, we lived in Israel for a year. I didn’t speak a word of Hebrew when we first got there, and I didn’t know a soul, but the ‘teacher’ made me stand facing into the corner at the front of the classroom, all the Israeli kids behind me sniggering at the pale, dumb kid who even the teacher didn’t like.

My mother had to pick me up from hospital one day – I’d had my head cracked open by a rock-wielding Israelite. I must admit, I may have thrown the first stone. But his was a lot bigger…

Introducing a true spiritual master: Tony Samara

Some people talk of the world ending in 2012 – personally I think that’s nonsense. The world won’t end; but our world just might, unless we evolve human consciousness from the fear mentality that currently pervades, to a new paradigm of love.

I have always had this feeling, this vision (and it has not faded) since I was a child. Indeed, as I have grown older, it has been re-affirmed.

Swami Vishnu Devananda founded the Sivananda Yoga teacher-training course because he had a vision during meditation of the world burning; human beings running around in chaos and fear and desperation. He created that yoga teacher-training course not so much to train yoga teachers as to train world leaders. He recognized that moral, ethical, and spiritual leadership throughout society would prompt change at a ‘grassroots’ level: the change that is necessary to avoid the kind of disaster we may be facing now.

When I learnt of this – as I took the teacher-training myself – I was deeply moved. I silently vowed to do all I could to become the kind of leader that Swami Vishnu envisioned. I did this not only out of love for him (although I never met him - he died in 1993, the year I discovered yoga - I have always felt a tremendous loyalty and love towards him). I did it also because I resonated with his vision, and because I love this Earth, this home that we all share; upon which we float together through space, and towards our shared destiny.

So my work for many years now has been about making a difference. My work as a therapist, healer, and teacher; running yoga retreats and healing holidays; and indeed everything I write; all comes from a heartfelt urge to create a more positive human society.

Today, I begin to do something more.

Today I tell you about a spiritual teacher called Tony Samara...

ARE YOU A SHEEP? Or are you being YOURSELF?!

Don't get me wrong - I love sheep. But not when they are pretending to be humans!!  


It was brought to my attention again very recently how un-human many humans are! I came off my bike, and was lying by the side of the road, wondering if I had broken anything. It was here in the hills where I live, and there was no-one around to help me - until a car came along... and passed... the passenger, a metre away, looking through the window, pointing at me, and laughing!


I would say that "I couldn't believe it", but the fact is, I wasn't all that surprised.... something very similar happened to me years ago in London - but that time I was in a busy street, surrounded by literally hundreds of people, and again, not a single person so much as asked if I was ok...