Andy leads a nomadic life, giving spiritual teachings mostly in India, the Mediterranean region and the UK. His teachings come as a response to the moment and reflect his own experience, rather than following a defined path. However, some see him as a Zen master, whilst others have commented on his deep connection with nature.

 

Since 1993, reiki has been central to his spiritual practice and he has been initiating others and teaching reiki since 2001. He has been offering public satsangs since 2010 and has also been involved with the Path of Love process since around that time.

 

When not involved in group processes, teaching or giving satsangs or one-to-one sessions, Andy tends to live a simple life, often roaming on a motorbike or wandering with a backpack and sleeping outdoors. He also works, from time to time, as a software engineer, usually in the field of petroleum reservoir modelling.

 

There follows a fuller biography of Andy, focussing on his spiritual journey. Most of the links on this page are to external websites.

 

Andy popped out into the world in 1963, in Chigwell, now part of North London. He grew up in the UK, spending much time outdoors, especially climbing trees. During his teenage years he began walking in the wilderness of north Dartmoor and came to love the wide open spaces and high places. He graduated from the University of Edinburgh with a degree in computer science and went to work for BP, initially as a software engineer and later as a reservoir engineer. During these years he developed a passion for mountaineering and rock climbing, spending time each summer in the European Alps.

 

At the age of 25, he married and soon fathered a son. The marriage was ill-fated though and after separation, Andy quit his job and, in 1992, went for his first extended travels, around the world. This was a journey which was to change the course of his life. Seeing other peoples, with different life styles, opened his eyes. Many of the people he saw had few possessions or wealth, yet they seemed at least as happy, if not happier, than most of the people he knew in the wealthy nations of Europe. So he began to question the materialist focus of Western life.

 

During the same journey, a chance meeting with Elaine Harris, in the south island of New Zealand, led him to reiki. Although hugely sceptical, he opted to be taught and initiated into the first level of reiki by the late John Veltheim. The immediate, intense, undeniable and unprecedented sensations in his hands and body shattered, in an instant, his dependence on mainstream science as the source of all truth. Without him even realising it at the time, Andy’s spiritual journey had begun.

 

Andy continued to work, on a freelance basis, as a hybrid software and reservoir engineer in the oil industry. However, at the start of 1995 he took the second level of reiki and the spiritual search became the focus of his life. For nearly seven years he was seeking intensely, reading widely but especially responding to J. Krishnamurti. Towards the end of this period, from 1999 to 2001, he studied the master level of reiki, under the guidance of Elaine Harris, and began teaching reiki.

 

In the spring and summer of 2001, Andy lived in a van in British Columbia and the Canadian Rockies and spent some months studying yoga with Elisabeth Meyer, herself a follower of Jean Klein. It was with Elisabeth, in August 2001, that the real breakthrough happened. Suddenly, during a breathing-energy treatment, Andy felt his self-doubt explode and disappear. With that, all effort dropped away; Andy had entered the stream.

 

After that initial explosion, the seeking aspect largely dropped away from Andy’s journey. His perspective on life became much less intellectual; in its place came a lived experience with the focus on direct perception and a meeting with, a communion with life, unobstructed by the thinking mind. What had been a struggle before became a playful exploration of energy.

 

In October of 2003, a further transition occurred. Andy graduated to the master teacher level of reiki, the conclusion of his reiki training, and shortly afterwards, the full significance of tantra was revealed to him in a spontaneous energetic happenstance with Elaine Harris. Although that event was beyond the capacity of language to describe, its effect was to burn up a large part of Andy’s sense of a separate self.

 

Also at that time, India finally started to call and in 2004, for the first time, Andy travelled to that ancient land. He spent a year exploring India and immersing himself in its spirituality. He has been returning almost every winter since then. During that first year in India, Andy came upon Osho in Pune, resonating with the joyful, celebratory message and the positive approach to sexuality. It was also in Pune that the Mystic Rose meditation process led Andy to his first prolonged experiences of the full buddha mode of being.

 

Andy’s own journey continued with a deeper exploration into the power of reiki and the mysteries of initiation. He also cleaned out some residual rubbish with groups including primal rebirth and the Path of Love. Also about this time another son, a love child, came into the world.

 

For a number of years, Andy has been informally teaching spirituality whenever the opportunity arises. These teachings reached greater depths when the mystical energetic aspect of satsang began to occur through him in 2009. In the winter of 2010 to 2011, he offered his first formal satsang series, in Tiruvannamalai, Tamil Nadu, India. Since then, he has also given open satsang series in Dharamsala (India), Göteborg (Sweden) and Koh Phangan (Thailand).

 

From 2012 to 2015 Andy trained with Rafia Morgan and Turiya Hanover (of the Path of Love) in their techniques of Working With People, including one-to-one session giving from the state of presence, as well as skills in authentic leadership and relationship counselling. He now offers sessions using these approaches, amongst others – contact him for more information.

 

Oh, it should be mentioned: Andy likes to drink tea.

 

The whereabouts page indicates Andy’s likely location in the coming weeks and months.

 

In the First Person is an occasional blog written by Andy.

 

The Received Wisdom audio series talks about some of the teachers who have influenced Andy along the way.