Instinct for Freedom: Finding Liberation Through Living

Alan Clements is an author, activist, performing artist and one of the first Americans to become a Buddhist monk in the country of Burma (Myanmar), where he lived for years training in intensive mindfulness meditation and existential Buddhist psychology. Since leaving Burma, he has become a spiritual maverick, working for global human rights and sharing his contemporary understanding of liberation to audiences around the world.

After decades of leading retreats, Instinct for Freedom is radical book of personal and planetary exploration, a visionary blend of adventurous autobiography, self-inquiry and independent thinking. Here Alan presents what he calls World Dharma, an approach to personal development that mirrors the narrative of his visionary life. He gives voice to an essential calling that is common to all people — a world dharma based in one precious human value: freedom, the liberation from fear, ignorance and dogma, and the elevation of dignity, conscience, and beauty.

For Clements, freedom is rooted in real life experience, in holding life's complexities in balance with its wondrous gifts, and in the transformational power of relationships with other people and with the world. Exploring the nature of consciousness and our place in the mysterious cosmos may be the key to our freedom, he says. In detailing the early years of his Dharma life living in silence in a Burmese monastery, Clements presents a rare, beautiful, and nuanced account of the actual experience of intensive mindfulness meditation and what it can offer.

Yet Clements's approach is not a doctrine. It is an intuitive process realized through deep inner trust, gentle self-inquiry and naturalness of spirit and expresses itself in daily acts of courage and love. No amount of spiritual practice or meditative training can adequately prepare us for life, he says. We must find our liberation through living in love, in this very moment, now, in whatever circumstances we face.

Clements has been interviewed on ABC National, Talk to America, CBC, VOA, BBC, the New York Times, Time and Newsweek magazines, the Sydney Morning Herald, Utne Reader, Yoga Journal, and scores of other media worldwide. He also delivered a keynote at Amnesty International's 30th Year Anniversary at the John Ford Theater in LA.  You can learn more about Alan's work on his website: www.AlanClements.com.

“Alan’s life is material for a legend. An intellectual artist, freedom fighter, former Buddhist monk, he shares his insights and experience with a passion rarely seen and even more rarely lived. He’ll make you think and feel in ways that challenge your entire way of being.” — Catherine Ingram, In the Footsteps of Gandhi and Passionate Presence

“During an era when a spate of shallow, narcissistic fiction has found a niche as ‘sacred literature’ Alan’s work is a wonderful relief and reminder that the heart of spirituality still is, and will always be, compassion. I am thrilled to see his rich and productive search being shared with wider and wider audiences.”
Bo Lozoff, author of We're All Doing Time & It's a Meaningful Life

“Alan’s profound and moving work addresses head-on the central question of our time – how to put meditation into action and so transform the real conditions of the real world. His honesty and passion are liberating, and his message both timeless and acutely timely.”
Andrew Harvey, author of The Direct Path and Sacred Activism

“Rarely has a book touched me as deeply and personally as Instinct for Freedom. This profound work is a call to action, a spiritual force for change.”Cheryl Richardson, author ``Stand Up For Your Life``

In 2002 Alan wrote Instinct for Freedom—Finding Liberation Through Living (World Dharma Publications), a spiritual memoir about his life in Burma and chronicles his pursuit of truth and freedom while illuminating the underlying framework of World Dharma. Instinct for Freedom was nominated for the best spiritual teaching/ memoir by the National Spiritual Booksellers Association in 2003 and has been translated into a numerous languages.

His most recent book, A Future to Believe In—108 Reflections on the Art and Activism  of Freedom  (World  Dharma  Publications,  2011) has received  distinguished praise from numerous leaders, visionaries and activists, including Dr. Helen Caldicott, Joanna Macy, Dr. Vandana Shiva, Bill McKibben, Paul Hawkin and Derrick Jensen (the renowned environmental poet laureate), who wrote: “This culture is killing the planet. If we are to have any future at all, we must unlearn everything the culture has taught us and begin to listen to the planet, to listen to life — the core intelligence of nature and the human heart. This book not only helps us with the unlearning process — the greatest challenge humankind has ever faced — it provides the essential wisdom, the spiritual intelligence, to open ourselves to finally start to hear.”

In his work as a spiritual activist, journalist and teacher, Alan has presented to such prestigious organizations as Mikhail Gorbachev’s State of the World Forum, the Soros Foundation, the United Nations Association of San Francisco, and the universities of Harvard, California, Toronto, Sydney, and many others; and in 1991 he gave the keynote address at the John Ford Theater for Amnesty International’s 30th anniversary.

“Alan’s life is material for a legend. An intellectual artist, freedom fighter, former Buddhist monk, he shares his insights and experience with a passion rarely seen and even more rarely lived. He’ll make you think and feel in ways that challenge your entire way of being.”
— Catherine Ingram, In the Footsteps of Gandhi and Passionate Presence

“One of the most important and compelling voices of our times . . . Alan Clements is a riveting communicator — challenging and inspiring.  He articulates the essentials of courage and leadership in a way that can stir people from all sectors of society into action; his voice is not
only a great contribution during these changeful times, it is a needed one.”
— Jack Healy, former director of Amnesty International, founder of the Human Rights Action Center.