Taken from My Piece of Peace : Introduction

 Taken from My Piece of Peace ISBN ‎ 978-1838440121 

Even before my trip to India, which in a way was unintentional, I was on a search.

I was 22 at the time. I had been studying chemistry at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, UK. I had started the course in 1968, thinking that if I could understand the chemistry and physics of the Universe around us, I would reach an understanding of the meaning of it all, including myself.

By the time I graduated, I had realised that I was wrong. Although science consists of achieving the same results from the same observations or reactions, so much of it was and still is based on theory and belief.

Whether it’s subatomic particles or black holes, the best we have is theory – one theory for the smallest and one theory for the largest. We have quantum mechanics and we have gravity waves. Science is still searching for a unified theory that will explain it all.

Most people cannot see either atoms or black holes – and strangely we are told that atoms are not solid yet black holes are not holes. We are told that mathematical calculations on the supposed mass and energy of the universe that that enables it to exist are only satisfied by accepting the existence of a mysterious dark matter and dark energy that we cannot otherwise detect. We don’t really know where the universe “came from”, we don’t really know how big it is or even if it is just one of many universes – that is multiverses.

Although I had (kind of) rejected religion when I was 13 and considered myself an agnostic or atheist, my very first experiment in chemistry in our garden shed, when I mixed calcium carbonate with dilute hydrochloric acid and observed the effervescent reaction, made me think that those chemicals were somehow aware of each other. They were conscious even if only on a chemical level. In school I was told that fire was a chemical reaction too. I was told that our brains function on electric impulses and signals and our digestive systems were chemical. Our Sun was a huge chemical reaction. Chemistry seemed to be everywhere.

Yet most of that we accept as true even if we cannot actually see it. Just like people’s beliefs in God or gods, science consists of a large amount of religious beliefs.

Before I had left the UK in 1972, I had read books that greatly influenced me such as The Tao of Physics by Fritjof Capra, in which he draws parallels between modern science and ancient religion, Aldous Huxley’s Doors of Perception and John Lilly’s The Center of the Cyclone, which discussed states of consciousness especially on hallucinogenic drugs such as LSD.

Those books and others, together with discussions with fellow students at UEA, led me to the belief in levels of consciousness, both higher and lower that “the norm”, and the part that drugs and meditation may play in that.

Then of course there were the items on the news about groups such as The Beatles and teachers such as Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, and the music that went along with it, including the likes of Pink Floyd and Jimi Hendrix. The whole hippie movement with the flowery clothes, drugs and long hair appealed to me.

By the time I left UEA I had tried cannabis and had long hair myself. I considered myself to be a sort of atheist anarchist pacifist vegetarian.