Over several decades I've found that identifying ourselves in terms of such spiritual qualities can be liberating. It can loosen the grip of the conviction life is primarily shaped by material factors and bring out a sense of health, rather than sickness, being the divine default.

I moved into the banking industry as soon as I graduated - it seemed the obvious thing to do when you are good with figures and have a head for business. But then I decided to give it all up on the search for something else, something bigger. I needed to answer all those questions that had been making their presence felt in my life and in my head for some time.

This week a friend of mine will walk away from his rapidly growing clothing line. He will switch off his iPhone, turn off his Mac, and drop out from Facebook, Twitter and every other social media. This week my friend will be ordained as a Buddhist monk.

A few years ago spurred by a friend I signed up for the 30 day Bikram yoga challenge. Having only ever tried yoga classes (Ashtanga) a couple of times before and intensely disliking the experience I was somewhat sceptical.

The original doom and gloom merchants touting a coming apocalypse were religious seers. Nowadays, though, faith-based threats of calamity tend to be...

When I pondered the idea of writing a blog today I immediately received the statement "The importance of shutting up". Obviously the Spirit said this ...

If this Christmas "state of mind" helps free us from stress during the holiday season wouldn't we want to keep bringing out these same spiritual elements in our lives throughout the year?

The 2011 census results were interesting, weren't they? The rising trend of atheism was a key finding, with 25.1% now saying that we have "no religion" versus 14.8% of us in 2001. As ever, I'm completely on trend, having been an atheist for almost thirty years.

I say we make December 21st our time to get real, get fabulous and start changing things for the better, get soulful, get spiritualized, one thought at a time.

The facts are there. Women have not achieved full equality because we are still objectified beyond belief. The rise of the Internet and the huge, gigantic market for pornography has left us more exposed than ever as the sex objects society likes us to be.

The machine, beeping steadily away in the background, reassuringly spells life. Suddenly it goes haywire. Something's wrong. The patient needs urgent...

My friend remarked on how he'd had the top medical care and had taken almost 10,000 pills in the eight years between the doctor's diagnosis and its reversal. Yet that time was still filled with such mental and physical lows that he frequently felt suicidal.

The most incredible, life changing stuff I have taken from my 'spiritual path' has been the down right sensible, the obvious, the 'tips for life' that take more from a therapeutic, humanistic approach than they do a magical or paranormal one.

What role, if any, should the NHS have in funding mind-body medicine and alternative medicines like homeopathy? It is a legitimate subject for debate, and one that Jeremy Hunt inherits in his new in-tray.

Whether I'm in the countryside or town, on a dark, cold, rainy night or a day lit and warmed by brilliant sunshine, one constant is clear to me - it is all made possible by that strange phenomenon we call Life - and I am drawn to wonder - what purpose does it have?

So you've got a headache and you want to be rid of it. It's simple, right? You take a tablet. Or is it? As the Global Year Against Headache draws...