I was walking without a shirt through the grounds of the casino in Darwin and I had a realization. My mind was totally engrossed in formulating excuses and reasons should I be confronted by someone who objected to my being there. I was worrying about a future which didn’t exist, which left me no time to enjoy the present.
I was born to be a traveler and now my real journey seemed about to begin. As a child I was always fascinated by the tales that were told by the hitchhikers that Dad would occasionally bring home. I would give up my bed to sleep with my brother and we would hear about the freedom of the road and I was left with a sense of awe of the world. The unknown was no longer scary but exciting.
The highlight of my childhood was the two years I lived in Kota Kinabalu in Sabah, North Borneo while my father was a teacher and my mother a voluntary nurse. I was the only white kid in my class and I loved being immersed in another culture and language. In 1970 we came home via Bali and I recall standing on Kuta beach as a ten year old holding my Dad’s hand. We were watching a beautiful sunset and there were heaps of travelers sitting around small fires enjoying the vista. "Look" He said, "These are all drug addicts". Having no idea what he was talking about, at that moment I decided I wanted to be one!
My final destination was to be England, with a stop to surf on the east coast of Sri Lanka. This involved riding buses and hiring drivers to get me through the landmined roads and bombed-out, smoking villages. There I met some people who told me amazing stories of India, a country I had never considered visiting.
I had to go and experience it myself. The stories they told were shocking but the way their eyes sparkled when they spoke convinced me. India was all they said, and more. In India I knew instantly I had lived there previously although, at the time, I had never considered the concept of past lives. I feel so much at home there that I experience more of a culture shock returning to the unreality of western society.
I did the usual Goa experience and felt alone when I wasn’t out of it. I know there had to be more to life than that so I went to Bombay, located the black market, sold my camera and continued on to England. I made it to my destination but quickly tired of what I perceived as depressed and superficial people, which was probably a reflection of myself. I longed for India, where the fragility and transience of life mirrors its vibrancy, energy and colour, where I knew I was alive. My life seemed deadly dull.
Sad and lonely, I hitchhiked north around Scotland and because a blizzard changed my direction I found myself at the Findhorn Foundation near Forres.
A year earlier a dear friend mentioned a book she had read, The Magic of Findhorn, and somehow that two-minute conversation reappeared. She told me of a spiritual community which communicated with plant spirits and grew humungous vegetables, although now they grow people. Why was I being led here?
In hindsight I believe I was experiencing my first miracle of coincidence and although I felt resistance I was also curious. I had no money for workshops or accommodation and was prepared to sleep in a barn. The only things I had to offer were two loaves of bread and a tin of sardines; gifts I had received while hitchhiking.

I was impressed that people were hugging each other, which was something I hadn’t seen before, but I was skeptical and spent that first week trying to arrange a lift out of there. Then I met Ambrose, the Irishman whose hand is holding the Findhorn glass ball on the cover of this book. He convinced me that I should partake in the ‘ experience’ week workshop starting the next day. Promising to repay the fee, with no intention of doing so, I stayed for another week.
I had never experienced anything like it. There were fourteen people from around the world who really wanted to be there and then me, a traveler who just ended up here by accident. I couldn’t believe the amount of problems I was seeing surface in the others. Though I was depressed and lonely I denied this and believed I was a happy-go-lucky traveler.
A week later, at the closing circle, Ambrose confronted me on wasting everyone’s time as I hadn’t partaken in the encounter in a real sense. Feeling separation and overwhelmed with rejection, I started to cry. He hugged me later and said I was halfway there. Halfway where? With the workshop over I felt frightened of the outside world and afraid of leaving such a safe and nurturing place. I headed for a zone I felt comfortable with, drugs and London.
My friends believed I was getting brainwashed into a religious cult but that wasn’t what I felt. Maybe my brain needed a good wash and for the first time I followed intuition and returned to Findhorn to cleanse my mind, body and spirit. I chose a week of ‘processing the past’ and a week of ‘developing a new life’.
While the course was truly beneficial it was my connection Judith Pintar, an American Celtic harpist, which brought about my most profound changes. Judith constantly confronted me, asking what I felt. She didn’t care what I thought. I had no idea I had suppressed my feelings for so long. I needed support to feel emotions without being punished.
I started to be honest with myself and examine feelings with full intensity. I had always used humour as my safety valve. Whenever things got too deep or too real I threw in a line of wit to deflate the pressure. Judith’s confrontation denied even this form of escape.
Judith made a huge impression on me and my growth became my focus. To symbolize this drastic change I reclaimed my given name, Gerar, and released the name, Paul, which resembled the old me, a name I had chosen aged five when I wanted to conform.
I felt like a new person and was starting to get in touch with my feminine and intuitive self.
Everything I have allowed myself to be I owe to my spiritual awakening at Findhorn. It offered me a safe and nurturing place to explore who I was and who I wanted to be. My real journey was just beginning. I felt alive and awake. For so long I had been sleepwalking.
People spend their money going on holiday for a suntan without realizing that for the same investment they could give their soul a holiday.
We create ourselves and our world daily and attract every experience whether it be joy, contentment, envy, sorrow, fear, love or pain. When we are not creating ourselves anew, in each moment, it is easy to see ourselves as victims and this limits the universe and prevents miracles.
Self-examination is the continuing practice of discovering who I am. With the help of LSD one full moon on Halong Bay, Vietnam, I realized I am not Gerar Toye, but an energy of love which is just hanging out in this skinbag for a while. So it feels weird to claim the quotes as mine. After all, who am I? Am I not a reflection of you and everyone else and all who have existed before? Are we not all children of God? Are we not an expression of God herself? We are all alone in this world with everyone else. Alone. All one.