(image credit) So imagine you are driving on autopilot, as we all do much of the time. Suddenly the car in front of you cuts you off quite unexpectedly. You slam your brakes and feel scared and indignant. Maybe you flash your lights or honk your horn at the other car. What’s your gut feeling about the other driver? I know my first reaction is that the driver is rude and obnoxious. Now imagine a different situation. You’re driving on... Read more

(cc) Alan Turkus I have been writing about meditation, spirituality, and inner resources for about 15 years now, mostly on the Internet.  On a few occasions, people have expressed to me that they think there is something self indulgent about meditation and contemplative spirituality.  These people apparently feel that meditators should be doing something to make the world better, rather than just sitting “doing nothing.” Also, on a couple occasions, people have expressed that they feel there is something a... Read more

As we rode home on the bus, I knew that we had made a difference.   I could see it in their eyes. The 13 students I had recruited from the ranks of the Honor Society, which I advised, had given up a Saturday morning to come with me, trusting that I was going to involve them in something meaningful. This was no ordinary field trip. Our school had recently taken its Advanced Placement students to the Experience Music Project in... Read more

The Tao Te Ching is the most popular book outside the Bible, with over 100 translations into English alone. Yet it is a completely naturalistic. It does not talk about gods, revelations, and miracles, but about harmonizing with the flow of nature. The Tao, explains Robert C. Solomon (2002, 41), “has much in common with what we are calling naturalized spirituality.” Who wrote this small but profound book? Originally it was credited to a man named Lao Tzu, who was supposed to... Read more

Episode 9: Stephen Batchelor is a Buddhist teacher and writer, known for his secular or agnostic approach to Buddhism. Stephen’s work has earned him both condemnation as a heretic and praise as a reformer. He was ordained as a novice Buddhist monk in 1974 and served 11 years within multiple traditions before disrobing and returning from South Korea to Europe. From 1990 he has been a Teacher at Gaia House meditation centre in Devon, England, and since 1992 a contributing editor... Read more

Series: Find Your Purpose Jerome is desperate. He drags himself to his office job every day, the one he’s had for 4 years now. He clocks in at 9, and starts doing client calls until 12. He then takes a half-hour lunch break, followed by a team meeting, and then more client calls until 5. The same old job, the same routine, and an overwhelming feeling of emptiness deep inside. He doesn’t know why he’s doing what he’s doing, he... Read more

At the beginning of her article “Are Animals ‘Things’?: The law evolves” (Harvard Magazine, March-April 2016), Cara Feinberg tells the story of a Texas couple whose family dog ran off and ended up in a shelter. The couple found him there the next day, but the shelter placed a “hold for owner” tag on the cage while the owners went to get cash needed to pay the fees. When they returned, the dog was gone. There had been a mix-up... Read more

by Kabir Edmund Helminski. Book Review by DT Strain. Book link in SNS Amazon Shop Kabir Helminski is a publisher and translator of numerous books of Sufi literature. He has worked for many years promoting Sufism and Jalaluddin Rumi’s works. He is also a producer and writer of Sufi music and a representative of the Mevlevi tradition founded by Rumi. In Living Presence, Helminski gives an insightful and fascinating tour of some of the most universal, deep, and yet practical... Read more

You probably have heard of it under of its many different names, mindfulness meditation, Buddhist meditation, and Insight Meditation. But in the original language of Buddhism, known as Pali, it is called Vipassana. To help you better understand Vipassana meditation, I would like to share a few definitions of what Vipassana is. The Venerable Rahula, in his book What the Buddha Taught, defines Vipassana as, “Insight into the nature of things, leading to the complete liberation of mind, to the realization... Read more

Episode 8: Many people associate non-attachment, equanimity, or acceptance with passivity or inaction. So how can these two concepts – non-attachment and taking action when/where needed coincide? Listen at www.SpiritualNaturalistSociety.org Click here to get Email notices of new episodes and SNS articles Learn about Membership in the Spiritual Naturalist Society See a full episode list at our main page for the Spiritual Naturalism Today podcast __________ The Spiritual Naturalist Society works to spread awareness of spiritual naturalism as a way... Read more