Alistair AppletonJan 214 minMeditationEvery broken heart is sacredThe final blog in my series of seven from 2013 is perhaps the juiciest of them all. I was all tender from a very intense, heart-breaking...
Alistair AppletonJan 56 minEmbodimentNo more future anymoreThis is a rather epic blog about the future and the nature of stress. Looking back from the vantage of 2022, I can see how the eight...
Alistair AppletonDec 15, 20216 minBuddhismLike worms towards the motorwayThe sixth of the blogs from 2014. This one is quite self-contained and doesn’t require many annotations from 2022. There is a Nibbana...
Alistair AppletonDec 15, 20214 minPsychologyBut now there is a forestThis is the third of the set of seven blogs I wrote back in 2014 following a chance encounter with one of my Buddhist teachers Ajahn...
Alistair AppletonDec 3, 20216 minDharmaIntention destroys the zombie mindContinuing my excavation of blogs from the past. These are my ponderings following a teaching that Ajahn Sucitto gave in Portugal. If you...
Alistair AppletonNov 3, 20216 minDharmaSucitto Thoughts #1Today is the birthday of one of my early Buddhist teachers, Ajahn Sucitto, who was the abbot of Cittaviveka monastery in East Sussex when...
Alistair AppletonOct 28, 20215 minPsychologyIn Praise of Idleness“Far from idleness being the root of all evil, it is rather the only true good.” Soren Kierkegaard This is a very old book review from...
Alistair AppletonOct 11, 20216 minLGBTQ+Coming out is (still) good for youThis is an article I wrote almost 10 years ago but it still seems to hit the right note. COMING OUT IS GOOD FOR YOU. This article was...
Alistair AppletonAug 13, 202111 minPsychologySame world, different sunglassesThis is a transcript from a Mindsprings Practice Space session. I’ve got a great question from one of our community, who submitted it in...
Alistair AppletonJul 15, 20214 minDharmaOn not caring: the creativity of upekkhaFrom the date on the cartoon, this blog was originally written in 2008. An almost mythically long time ago. But the thoughts on caring...
Alistair AppletonJun 18, 20216 minPsychologyThe Prohibition Against Asking for HelpI 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...
Alistair AppletonJun 11, 20214 minPsychologyYou are a child of the universeA blog piece refurbished from the archives. But no one tires of hearing about amazing teenagers and the vast sweep of the future that...
Alistair AppletonMay 7, 20216 minPlaces“Being incarnate is a business”, Iris Murdoch.Adrian’s boyfriend was telling me about epiphytic plants which are not directly parasitic on the tree they dwell on but rather hop on…
Alistair AppletonMar 12, 20218 minTherapyFreudThis is a tidied up transcript of an answer I gave in the Live Sessions in February 2021. Tamsyn mentioned her dislike of reading Freud...
Alistair AppletonMar 5, 20218 minDharmaMother Nature doesn’t care about suffering. Buddha does.I have been really deeply inspired by the experience of leading the Dharma Days for Mindsprings. After my initial introduction to the...
Alistair AppletonFeb 25, 20215 minMeditationDynamiting the prison of the presentKaren spoke about feeling trapped in the present. As meditators, we’re always encouraged to stay in the present and “be here now”, but...
Alistair AppletonFeb 21, 20196 minDharmaMögu & My Problem with TeachersThe need to be a ‘know-it-all’ I have a problem with teachers. When I was little – for various reasons I won’t bore you with – I always...
Alistair AppletonOct 24, 20185 minPsychologyThe Morning Dread: Shaking Hands with AnxietyA horrible year of anxiety completely ruined my sleep cycle. I used to sleep like a log. Like my father in fact, who falls asleep...
Alistair AppletonMar 28, 20183 minDharmaHEATH ROBINSON MACHINES: Uninventing the Ego ContraptionWhile we up on Holy Island this month, the retreatants and I were discussing the ludicrous tangles our thinking minds get into. When we...
Alistair AppletonMar 27, 20184 minDharmaEGO TRIPS: You can’t be at your own funeralSpeaking personally, the ‘ego’ and everything to do with it was a real turn-off for me previous to this Summer. There was something about...