Tim Freke - Soul Story: Evolution and The Purpose of Life

T!M FREKE is a pioneering philosopher and respected authority on world spirituality, whose work has touched the hearts and minds of hundreds of thousands of people worldwide.

He has a BA honours degree in philosophy and is the author of more than 30 books, which have been translated into 15 languages, including an international bestseller and Daily Telegraph Book of the Year.

Tim presents life-changing events exploring spiritual awakening, internationally and online. He has often been featured in the global media, such as the BBC and the History Channel.

EVOLUTION AND
THE PURPOSE OF LIFE

T!M FREKE

ive chosen an unconventional presentation style for this book because i want your reading experience to be as lucid and transformational as possible

were going to be exploring some exciting new ideas, so it feels right to present them in an exciting new way

while writing this book ive aspired to express my ideas as concisely as possible, and to complement this ive adopted a minimalist style of presentation

this means there are no full stops or capital letters, except for design reasons, and ive used commas, dots and line breaks to vary the reading rhythm

ive dispensed with conventional paragraphs and separated ideas out, indenting sentences that follow on from a first thought, which will allow you to clearly consider ideas one at a time

at the back of this book youll find a glossary of the new terminology ive created to help me articulate the innovative philosophical ideas i want to share with you

to ask me questions about the ideas in this book, express your own thoughts, debate with others and keep up with my latest insights, visit my website www.timfreke.com

if youd like to experience the spiritually awakened state i invite you to join me at the deep awakening, which is a wonderful mix of spiritual retreat and celebration of life, designed to open the heart as well as inspire the mind find out more on my website

contemporary society is experiencing a soul crisis, caused by the cultural dominance of objectivist science and the demise of outdated religion, which has left us adrift in a meaningless universe

in this book i want to suggest the solution is a revolutionary new philosophy i call emergent spirituality, which brings together the scientific theory of evolution with a fresh understanding of perennial spiritual insights to reveal the deep purpose of life

i want to take you on an exhilarating journey through a huge number of new ideas, dealing with the nature of time, soul, purpose, volition, death and magic

in this chapter i want to start by looking at how science and spirituality offer us opposite perspectives on the ambiguous nature of reality

what is life? does it have a purpose? is it going somewhere? do our individual lives have any importance? is death the end or could there be more?

ive been contemplating such questions since i was a child, which is how ive ended up becoming a philosopher

the problem ive found myself confronting when seeking clear answers is that, in my experience, the nature of existence is extremely ambiguous

sometimes life has seemed so magical its taken my breath away and ive felt sure there must be profound meaning to our existence

yet other times life has seemed so futile ive felt asphyxiated and then the idea that existence is a meaningless accident has seemed much more credible

ive had sublime experiences which have filled me with the deep conviction that theres a supreme being of love who is guiding our lives

but then ive witnessed the horrendous suffering in the world and the idea of an indifferent universe has seemed much more likely

in attempting to understand the nature of existence ive felt pulled in two different directions

on the one hand ive felt attracted to a spiritual understanding of life, because this addresses my magical experiences of the numinous nature of reality

but on the other hand ive found myself drawn to a scientific understanding of life, because this offers me a rational explanation of the material universe

so ive struggled with reconciling these opposite perspectives, each of which seems to describe one aspect of my ambiguous experience

the adventures of my life, through which ive grown as a human being, have felt deeply meaningful to me but my understanding of science has forced me to look at the bigger picture and ask awkward questions

if existence is expressing some deep meaning, what is the point of those strange fish lurking in the darkness of the deep ocean and the plethora of ugly insects infecting us with vile diseases and the trillions of desolate planets in our vast cosmos that dont support life?

science has discovered a universe that has been evolving for 13.8 billion years, which has left me with contradictory feelings

ive been so awed by the magnificence of the cosmos its seemed absurd to believe this could all exist for no reason

but ive found it hard to conceive of a grand cosmic purpose that includes 180 million years of lumbering dinosaurs!

what does it mean to be a human being in the 21st century, now that science has rejected the idea that we were created in gods image, and we see ourselves as monkeys who wear clothes?

sometimes it has seemed to me that there is an essential goodness within people, who are doing their best in difficult circumstances

but other times weve seemed more like parasites that have infected this beautiful planet and are unconsciously killing our host

as a curious human being ive wanted to understand life as i actually experience it, which means accounting for all the perplexing ambiguities of existence

ive been determined not to hide from the bleak realities of life but ive needed to account for the intense optimism that often surges within me making me sure that something wonderful is going on

despite all the evidence to the contrary, ive been unable to shake off the intuitive conviction that there is a profound purpose to this bittersweet life which redeems the horror and reveals the true significance of the human adventure

in light of these dilemmas ive spent the last period of my life developing a worldview that accounts for the paradoxical nature of existence, by reconciling the inspirational, intuitive insights of deep spirituality with the pragmatic, empirical discoveries of modern science

the problem ive faced in creating this synthesis, however, is that spirituality is still largely stuck in an outdated, pre-rational, religious mind-set

and science has now established itself as the new religion with all the same narrow, domineering, fundamentalist tendencies as all the old religions

what is the meaning of life? to simply ask the question can feel ridiculous, because in the intellectual mainstream of our culture its now assumed that life has no meaning

the grand religious narratives that gave us meaning in the past have crumbled under sceptical scrutiny, so we put our faith in science, which uses reason to describe a universe which exists without a reason