Spiritual Mentorship .
If you are looking for help in your spiritual life, you’re in the right place. For you, this could mean living free from suffering, recognising your true self, realising truth or finding God (as you imagine Him or Her to be).
If you are looking for help that focuses primarily on more immediate practical matters like career, relationships or personal effectiveness, visit my coaching area instead.
As a Spiritual Mentor, I:
Testimonials
For nearly 40 years, I’ve found solace, comfort and inspiration from dozens of spiritual teachers, including Elkhart Tolle, Mooji, Gangaji, Rupert Spira, and Adyashanti. However, one-on-one spiritual counsel is virtually impossible with any of them, due to their name recognition.
Doug has the unique ability to help me navigate multiple layers of questioning, from short term career/relationship problem solving through to guiding a deeper reflection of what “this” is all about. I have a deep interest in life’s big questions and mysteries, but I also live a pretty normal life grappling with everyday problems, aspirations and goals. Over the years, Doug has been one of the key sounding boards that has helped me bring the pieces of the puzzle together.
Doug is a mentor, spiritual teacher and intellectual guide in exploring the fundamental concerns of life. He is a self-realized being, and his sincere intent to help others is admirable. A gifted healer, Doug helped me see the light from the place of darkness I was in. (A guru is one who guides you from darkness to light).
Primary Approaches
On my own path, I’ve found it helpful to combine clarity practices and heart practices. We can employ either or both.
- Clarity practices might be called ‘head-led’. They include following pointers to the Truth from different wisdom traditions, uncovering hidden aspects of your intellectual conditioning and conducting self-inquiry.
- Heart practices could be termed ‘body-led’. These work with your reactions to intense emotions. They help you use normal life experience to identify and shine light on your shadow elements, allowing you to re-integrate a full self and to maintain balance in a greater range of situations.
- Ultimately, these different paths unite, as the work of relaxation and integration forms a mutually supportive cycle with the shedding of false assumptions and an ‘upgraded’ and ever-lighter conceptual lens.
Working Together
My approach is flexible. We can meet for one session, add individual ones as we go, or design and book an entire programme.
This all starts with a free exploratory discussion in which:
- You help me understand your situation and what you would like to get from our engagement.
- I address any questions you have about myself and how I work.
- I share initial thoughts about my ability to help and ways we might proceed.
- We agree the pricing structure: following our initial discussion, additional one-hour sessions cost £75 each.
Arrange an exploratory discussion about Spiritual Mentorship .
Life Purpose
Writings that reflect my approach
Dirty Enlightenment
Nothing needs to be different from how it is right now for us to be okay. There is no problem with the way things are in this or any moment. This understanding can yield a deep relaxation in which personal ups and downs unfold.
What Osho’s ‘Commandments’ Mean to Me
Osho opened new doors to truths that for many had become dead. He rejected intellectual, social and spiritual tradition, shining fresh light on ancient wisdom. Osho wouldn’t really submit to or issue commandments, free-wheeling spirit that he was. But here’s as close as he came.
How to Fulfil Your Life’s Purpose
What if we knew our life’s purpose with absolute clarity? What energy we could draw on! How free we would be from worrying about unimportant noise and distraction!
Even better, imagine we understood how to fulfil it. It’s possible, but it demands great self-awareness, intimately knowing who we really are.
Set Down the Burden, Taoism’s Way
We carry unnecessary emotional backpacks through life. The more we see them in their proper context, the more frequently we can set them aside. They may always accompany us, but we needn’t bear their weight.
Faces of God
The world’s wisdom traditions point to one truth, but each highlights distinctive features. Spend time with each to see the summit from different angles before choosing your path to it. Here’s what I’ve found in several.
Anxiety as a Glimpse of Freedom
Spiritual progress involves movement toward surrender or letting go, and this corresponds to a shift in the view of self: from being a separate agent to being an inseparable aspect of a unitary process. With that recognition, it becomes clear that security, certainty and control don’t exist and never did. We may feel anxiety as a product of moving into vulnerability and openness, while still carrying a sense of separateness.