Today’s world makes ever-increasing demands on us, but in modern spirituality we can find heartening new solutions that give us the energy, motivation and inspiration to develop ourselves and transform our world.

In The Power of Modern Spirituality, Dr William Bloom, the UK’s leading mind, body and spirit teacher, shares his wise and revolutionary approach to spiritual fulfilment.

His comprehensive and practical guidance will help you achieve a greater sense of personal integrity, purpose and calm, whatever your beliefs or background. Discover for yourself enduring spiritual wellbeing.

Best practice for those seeking to integrate modern spirituality into their professional and daily lives. This is the essential, realistic and inspiring text.

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‘This is a marvellous book full of practical wisdom and helpful suggestions how to nurture spiritual growth in everyday life. Connecting the best of the traditional religious practices of different faiths with some of the newest insights of modern therapeutic practice and a scientific worldview, William Bloom shows how we can become vessels for the energy of spirit. Truly holistic and inclusive, this book comes out of a lifetime’s practice and experience and skillfully conveys the transformative power of spirituality in human life.’
Ursula King, Professor Emeritus of Theology and Religious Studies, University of Bristol and a vice president of the World Congress of Faiths; author The Search for Spirituality: Our Global Quest for Meaning and Fulfilment.

‘William Bloom’s excellent book succeeds in being both passionate and solidly grounded in experience. The frequent accusation that the emerging spirituality of our times is superficial and ill-disciplined will be difficult to sustain in the light of this deeply reflective book which is scholarly, rigorously researched, practical and beautifully written. It also bears ample witness to the dedicated pursuit of spiritual wisdom in the context of a compassionate life. Its list of resources and further reading is in itself immensely valuable. It should be of great value to spiritual companions and explorers of many kinds.’
Brian Thorne, Emeritus Professor of Counselling, University of East Anglia, Lay Canon of Norwich Cathedral

‘William Bloom disentangles spirituality from religion and lucidly distils its essence for everyone. A wonderful and accessible text that will serve as a manual for spiritual seekers for decades to come.’
Dr David Hamilton, author Why Kindness is Good for You and The Contagious Power of Thinking.

‘William Bloom has been hailed as “the UK’s leading mind, body and spirit teacher.”  If so, the UK is well served for in his latest book Bloom summarizes with practices and well thought-out strategies the many ways to a deeply ecumenical, intelligently psychological and spiritually meaningful way of living deeply in the world. He is in tune with the spirit of our times and his book serves notice that there is spirituality after religion and even, potentially, within religion. A genuine contribution to contemporary spirituality!  One awaits his promise of a “collective messiah,” that is all of us resurrecting and awakening to the gift we share that is Life itself on this blessed planet and this ups the ante on our responsibility to work generously to balance contemplation with action and to preserve our sacred earth and holy selves.’
Matthew Fox, author of Original Blessing, The Coming of the Cosmic Christ, The Hidden Spirituality of Men, Christian Mystics et al.

Read the Church Times review. (This was a breakthrough, to have it recommended as Lent reading for clergy.)

Feeling safe is vital to leading a successful and healthy life

 

This much needed book provides effective strategies for managing the challenges and stimulation of modern living.

Bestselling author Dr William Bloom shows you how to deal with life’s unpleasant realities and, at the same time, be secure, strong and confident.

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He explains how to:

* Increase your inner strength and confidence.

* Maintain a calm body, open heart and generous mind.

* Manage crises with courage and grace.

* Protect yourself from negativity.

* Make others feel safe and secure.

* Be a positive influence for a better world.

 

This is an excerpt from Chapter One

THE NEED FOR SAFETY

Recognising that feeling safe is the foundation for true success and personal development

You may be familiar with the experiments in which baby monkeys were removed from their mothers shortly after birth. They were given the best possible food and nutrients. They were kept in a perfect temperature. But they were left alone most of the time, cut off from the warmth and nurture of their mothers and families.

These little creatures did not develop well. This traumatic beginning affected the whole of their lives. They were uncertain of themselves and easily frightened. Their big lost eyes were haunted with a need for reassuring comfort. They suffered mood swings, their behaviour moving between timid and aggressive. They had great difficulty fitting into their society.

Feeling insecure, these monkeys were unable to develop normally. It is the same with people when they lack the foundation of physical and psychological security.

Have you looked in someone’s eyes when they are frightened or anxious? Traumatised and shocked, people are diminished. Watch people emerging from a tragic crash or disaster. They are smaller, frail, bewildered.

On a less dramatic scale, look into the eyes of someone who has just been rejected or not achieved what they wanted or expected. I watched a businessman coping with the loss of a deal that he had worked on for many months. His jaw jutted. His shoulders were pulled back. He strutted. He was aggressive. But his eyes were wide and defensive. Psychologically, he had temporarily collapsed and a little boy who had lost his security blanket was revealed beneath all the macho wheeling and dealing.

This is the great problem that so few people appreciate. When people experience a lack of safety – no matter what front they present to the world – they are unable to deal effectively with life. Something collapses within. Watch a child frightened by a bully; he shrinks. Watch an adult sensing that a party or bar or night club is not his place; he too will shrink. Workers faced with information overload are reduced from confident and creative productivity to a frozen inertia. A tourist enters an historic place that has a foreboding and haunted atmosphere, and he too will stop uncertain whether to move forward. Some people will sense a wave of dread as a global political situation moves towards awful conflict. People who are abused and traumatised literally shrink and freeze.

The world – especially the human world – is not a safe place, so what is the best way to handle it? The answer surely is to build up your own inner sense of safety. In this way, no matter what is happening around you, you have a stable base from which to operate. You can comfort and reassure any insecure monkeys you have within you, and you can face the world with reassurance and goodwill.

When people have this core safety, they feel confident and good, able to move with freedom and a positive attitude. Happy, truly successful and fulfilled people feel safe. They are able to handle the challenges and crises of life, and they are a supportive and encouraging blessing to the people around them.

The whole of this book is dedicated to helping you build that enduring and authentic state within yourself.

The Foundation of Personal Development

Feeling safe is one of the foundations of a normal, happy and fulfilling life. You simply cannot get on with the basic business of living if you feel insecure, frightened or anxious.

People need shelter, food and clothing just as a starting point for their security. It is tragically obvious that you cannot begin to grow into your full potential if you are worried about where the next meal is coming from or if you and your family might die. Those who live in war, famine and disaster zones, those who live in dangerous societies, they have no choice but to give all their energy to the stark reality of survival. Worse, some people have been so injured that they have no where to focus except on their own wounds and trauma. There is no time and no resources for the more profound purposes of human life – the search for meaning and fulfilment, spiritual growth, personal development, love and the bettering of the human and global condition.

But fear, anxiety and trauma are not only created by physical threat. People also need a core of psychological security. If, for example, you feel that you have no acceptable social identity, this can be as threatening as having a revolver held to your head. This is not a shallow affair. Some people, when they lose their jobs or their money or their status, prefer to end their lives than live without their previous sense of identity. They would rather die than lose their status. Whenever there is a financial slump, suicides increase. Men with families and good physical health die. People with no inner foundation collapse into shame and confusion.

Then there is the psychological threat that comes from being the target of prejudice – an outsider. It is impossible to feel safe when the people with whom you live and work do not accept you. It is exhausting and debilitating. The target of prejudice – because of race or gender or disability –hostility and threat are always there, seen and unseen.

To feel safe is the natural bedrock of a human being’s healthy development. Without that safety, there is ongoing nervousness – conscious and unconscious – and your ongoing behaviour can be hijacked, for example, by deep personality traits of bombast or victimisation. Bullies and braggarts are always psychologically insecure; as are those who whinge or manipulate. Without a sense of safety, there is no vitality or fuel for balanced growth and success. Your energy drains away through endless tension and maintaining postures of aggression or defence.

Even when people achieve material success and social status, there is no guarantee that they will lose their tension and find psychological security. According to recent research, materialistically successful people, for example, experience more nightmares than less driven folk. Accumulating wealth, possessions and power may create more threat and anxiety for an insecure person who has a need to control – there is just more stuff now to regulate. Look at the control freaks you know. Be aware of your own need to control. Its source is a lack of inner safety.

Success often camouflages fear and, even worse, stimulates feelings of anxiety. Equally, powerful physical protection may not do the job. Fortresses, castles, weapons, bodyguards, and all the martial and self-defence arts do not make insecure people feel secure.

The world is a dangerous place in too many ways. And people are insecure in so many ways.

The purpose of this book therefore is to help everyone develop an authentic internal sense of safety regardless of life circumstances – rich or poor, status or no status, peace or conflict. This kind of internal security comes from an inner strength and wisdom. It is a permanent part of your character. It is also a positive trait for the community around you. It makes other people feel safe too. It is great to have neighbours, colleagues and friends who are solid. They are the ones we turn to in crisis.

On the streets, if someone is called ‘safe’ it is a sign of approval and acceptance. It means that person is cool and has a positive presence. The safe person stays calm and intelligent – and knows when and when not to act. You are cool, but not coldly detached. Observant, but not a hostile witness. You do not stand by when someone is being bullied or hurt. Your presence has strength, even warmth. There is something about you that is watchful, careful and encouraging. You are good to have around.

 

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In Working with Angels bestselling author and teacher Dr William Bloom presents reveals a world that lies behind everyday reality and shows you how to co-operate with these invisible beings of energy who are a fundamental part of every aspect of our lives.

Learn:

• How to sense angels and spirits and communicate with them
• How to co-operate with this inner world for inspiration and guidance
• How to work with angels for healing and spiritual growth
• How they can help you fulfil yourself and help others
• How they can bring you a deeper understanding of all aspects of life.

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Reviews

‘Absolutely terrific book. Little masterpiece. In this enchanting book, William Bloom shares historic and personal details about the mythic existence and contemporary reality of our invisible spiritual friends with whom we share this planet. I highly recommend this book for several reasons, but most of all because I am grateful that someone finally took up the task of separating new age nonsense from spiritual reality.’
Caroline Myss PhD, author of Anatomy of the Spirit and Why People Don’t Heal and How They Can

‘With each new book, William Bloom continues to enhance his position as one of the finest modern writers on spiritual themes. This book can only further his reputation. Working with Angels is outstanding both for its insights, its loving wisdom, and its clear, simple instructions for working with angelic beings. I have every expectation that it will become a classic in its field. I recommend it without reservation.’
David Spangler, author of Everyday Miracles

‘In a moving, candid and funny book, [William Bloom] gives crystal-clear information about the hidden forces that shape our reality, and combines intuition and intellect in opening to the angelic realms. Packed with fascinating anecdotes from his wealth of personal experience, he makes working with angels seem as ordinary  and as essential  as brushing our teeth. Brilliant. I loved it!’
Gill Edwards, author of Living Magically and Stepping Into the Magic

‘Before my own perceptions of the elemental and angel world were clear enough, I got a sense of their presence through William Bloom’s teaching and writing. It is wonderful that his new book has such a range of exercises. It is time for everybody to exercise communication with these subtle worlds!’
Marko Pogacnik, author of Nature Spirits and Elemental Beings: Working with the Intelligence in Nature

˜William Bloom writes clearly and persuasively of parallel worlds which exist side by side with ordinary reality, but which the vast majority of us have been taught successfully to block out of our awareness. He has a unique ability to make the mysterious accessible and understandable. He leads readers far into the subtle realms while making sure we keep our feet on the ground.’
Leo Rutherford, founder of Eagle’s Wing School of Shamanic Studies and author of Elements of Shamanism

‘Working with Angels, Fairies and Nature Spirits is not a book that fos- ters escapism or romance. William Bloom reminds us of the spirit world, and the inherent help, beauty and magic that is available to us in both mysterious and practical ways.’
Angeles Arrien PhD, cultural anthropologist and author of The Four-Fold Way and Signs of Life

‘Joyfully easy to read and follow, Working with Angels, Fairies and Nature Spirits filled in gaps in my own understanding. William Bloom provides concrete and comprehensive explanations of the world of spirit; and gives helpful suggestions for how we our- selves can contact the angels and spirits. He shows how what seems to be empty space is filled with energetic life – physical, emotional, mental and spiritual – life that is part of a loving and understandable universe, a marvellously coherent universe.’
Dorothy Maclean, author of To Hear the Angels Sing and Choices of Love

 

From a reader:

This is a heartfelt “THANK YOU!”

All my life I have been aware of and participatory with the spirit energies around me, but reluctant to talk about it with many people. I have close friends who share this but until reading your book “Working with Angels, Faeries and Nature Spirits” I had a difficult time talking about it or feeling how truly normal and natural this is!

So many people talking and writing in this area come across (at least to me) as seeking out experience to take them out of our physical existence into what they see as a ‘higher realm’ but without the ability to connect spirit energy firmly in this life on this planet.You quite clearly have integrated all the experience and understanding you’ve gained into a whole view and a lived experience. I am sharing this book with my sister now after she recently told me that her smaller children have been relating to the nature spirits and building places to honor them in the woods around their home.

Several months ago my art studio became infused with a guiding spirit who has completely transformed the way I relate to and create art. This after being an artist for over 30 years and feeling I had still not connected fully with a deeper relationship to the sacred in my work. Now I feel it as a relationship and a guided play that is helping specific forms to manifest. I have literally felt that my Art Angel is using my hands to make gifts for other people.A few months ago I had an “Open Studio” and was astonished to watch what happened as people walked into my studio. Their faces began to glow, they lit up and did not want to leave — several people went directly to specific pieces and said to me “This is mine.” Some wanted me to come to their homes to find the right place in their environment for their gift. I have come to see that I don’t need to know who the gift is for or why it’s theirs in order to create it with the help of the beautiful spirit in my art space.

This is a revelation that has freed me from all the ridiculous ‘artistic ego’ notions about what I am doing — I have to move my studio space in April and after reading your book I have a much better feeling about that. I know that the spirit energy helping me is not tied just to this particular place (although I do feel it’s qualities helped invite her!) and that I can ask ‘her’ to come with me!So – again – thank you so much and I look forward to deepening my own relationship with the help of your book. And will definitely be sharing it with other friends.Grateful blessings to you!
Elaine Treadwell

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