I was on a powerful retreat in the Devon countryside a few weeks back and I had a startling flash of memory from my childhood. I recalled a phrase that my mother used to say to me: “Ask Doesn’t Get”. And by that, I assume, she meant that children who ask for things , don’t […]
A blog piece refurbished from the archives. But no one tires of hearing about amazing teenagers and the vast sweep of the future that lies before them. I spoke to the young men and women of St. James back at the time of the Arab Spring. A lot has happened since then. Not least the […]
This is another blog fished out of the annals. I probably wrote it about 10 years ago. I have subsequently read Joyce’s magnum opus for the third time. Not to crow but just as a triple advert for its brilliance. Perhaps it might tempt you to dive in! Just finished James Joyce’s ‘Ulysses’ for the […]
This is another find from the archive. It must have been more than 7 years ago that I revisited Berlin. Post pandemic the idea of international travel for no other reason than to visit people seems incredible. And the reflections about doing things rather than conceptualising them also seems salient to our lives as we […]
Browsing through the big archive of material that used to sit on my alistairappleton.com blog, I came across this cri-de-coeur from my self around 2009. It’s strange how – as you get older – these things seem to settle. I no longer feel at all squeamish about my dreams or mythology or the mystical. Cambridge […]
This is a ‘re-run’ of a blog I wrote more than 10 years ago but still seems relevant – especially to the 5th Being of the Beingfulness practice: Being Emotional. I’ve been filming down in Herefordshire and Dorset for ‘Escape’, which means I’ve also been out in the cold a lot in this chilly Northwind. […]
This is a tidied up transcript of an answer I gave in the Live Sessions in February 2021. Tamsyn mentioned her dislike of reading Freud during her therapy training, and I jumped to his defence… The thing about Freud is, he is a stylist. Freud is a Viennese writer of the 1900s. He’s an amazing […]
I have been really deeply inspired by the experience of leading the Dharma Days for Mindsprings. After my initial introduction to the bells and whistles of Tibetan Buddhism up at Samye Ling and on Holy Island twenty years ago, I found myself hankering after something simpler and more austere. And so I really immersed myself […]
Karen spoke about feeling trapped in the present. As meditators, we’re always encouraged to stay in the present and “be here now”, but what if I feel claustrophobic and stuck in a present that seems to be full of stress and worry and demands? That sounds like a very productive place to be. I think […]
This is a transcript from this recent recorded lesson at The Mindsprings Practice Space Alistair: You were saying that you were feeling a bit poorly and you’re not feeling top-notch. And – rather provocatively – I was saying it doesn’t matter what you’re feeling! I think this is really super important and I can’t emphasise […]
