I recently heard a radio interview with Professor Gordon Parker who was for many years associated with the Black Dog Institute which as you may know seeks to help those suffering from depression. In the course of the interview, the interviewer asked Professor Parker how he would distinguish between depression and melancholia. Without hesitation Parker […]

You might wonder why I might have imbued my new book with such a title. Those of you that have read my small offerings over the years would know that I have a belief that most of the great truths are propagated through stories and often through the use of parable and metaphor. I like […]

In my blog essay last week, I stipulated how important to our personal well-being it is be able to cultivate a sense of equanimity in our internal world, our theatre of mind. Our state of mind, rather than our external circumstances, is the prime determinant of our well-being. You and I both know people whose […]

As I have written often, the essential nature of our humanity comes from our consciousness of self. From this faculty we immediately are confronted by two worlds. The first is the world “out there”, the physical world of objects, space, matter and other beings. The second is the world we are aware of within ourselves, […]

After I wrote my recent essay which I entitled “A God for Our Times” Bruno made the following comment: You articulate clearly your “future god”. But what purpose does he serve? It seems that you still describe an adult/child relationship. He is still a “god of the gaps”. We don’t need a god to live […]

If you read my blogs you might come to the conclusion that I am reasonably opinionated. I certainly have shared with you opinions on some of the more controversial subjects such as politics and religion. But I must confess that there are areas where I feel frustrated that I can’t make up my mind. One […]

In the beginning there were many gods. As Man’s consciousness evolved and he tried to make sense of his world, he invented gods to help explain it. Early on most gods related to natural phenomenon like the moon and the sun, rain and floods, fertility and fecundity and so on. Such gods were often embodied […]

A few weeks ago, I was having a geriatric jog, as I am occasionally wont to do, when I pulled a muscle in my lower calf on my right leg. Over the years I have damaged muscles reasonably frequently. Normally you just stop running for a while and revert to walking until the muscle repairs […]

The good Dr Phil told me a story once about his visit to a very traditional workplace. It was a workplace characterised by low productivity, high industrial militancy and the inevitable alienation of the workforce. In walking around he came across one of the more renowned malingerers, (let’s call him Fred), loitering outside the workshop. […]

My recent book, “Froth and Goblets”, tells the story of how a Buddhist adept helps a princess deal with her depression. The story is a parable, but as many parables do, it contains some serious teachings. In this essay, I thought I might explore in a little more depth, some of the basic tenets of […]