Around three decades ago I heard about Findhorn… I was around 11 – 12 years old when I visited my cousins in Philadelphia. I begged my cousins to bring me to the bookstore and it was there when I picked up a book on Findhorn-I think the first book on Findhorn… It was a paperback… I was amazed. I was astonished. I was enthralled and I fell in love. This was the Western version of Shambala/Shangrila on earth. I read the book and re-read the book and I wanted so much to live in a community that communed with Nature. That lived on principles of spirituality, love, respect of environment and eachother. I really was amazed such a place existed.

Findhorn propitiated the natural elemental beings to bless their gardens, flowers, environments and properties and as a result they had roses that bloomed in the snow, 40 pound cabbages, and vegetables that grew in the sand… many have visited and were amazed.

I have been in love with Findhorn ever since. I do not want to add to Findhorn as it is more than fine the way it is, but I wanted to send them a gift to say how much I admire their way of life, their respect for eachother and the earth. I wanted to send a gift to celebrate how they are such a wonderful example of how we are suppose to live with our earth. I really wanted to say thank you to them for being who they are and having the courage to live correctly. I’ve been wanting to send a gift a while ago, but didn’t have a chance… I hope to create something like this in the future.

I am so happy that people at Findhorn were happy with my gift and prayers for their further success… I thank everyone at Findhorn… beautiful. I will send some more items for all of them to share soon. It’s just my way of saying-keep doing what you are doing!!

Well it was nice to know my gift has arrived in Findhorn… a magical place I admired since I was a small child… May all who join Findhorn have peace, growth and true spiritual awakening… I send you all my sincerest good wishes.

Tsem Rinpoche

[Extracted from: http://www.findhorn.org/2011/04/a-gift-from-tibet/#.USy4kuuSC1k] 

A Gift From Tibet

15 April 2011

Very unexpectedly a wonderful gift has arrived in the Findhorn Foundation Communications department. 

Tsem Tulku Rinpoche, a high incarnate Lama from the Gaden Shartse Monastery, South India, sent a sculpture of Lama Tsongkhapa, a renowned Tibetan Buddhist scholar and practitioner, as a sign of his appreciation of the Findhorn Foundation. The sculpture was accompanied by a box containing a smaller statue of Tsongkhapa and a meditation book.

Tsem Tulku Rinpoche expresses his appreciation for the work of the Findhorn Foundation in a beautiful letter:

I have long been an admirer of your founders, organisation, and what you have stood for.

I sincerely pray for the continued success of the beautiful works and example you are showing the world. I, as a Buddhist monk, would like to send you a special gift to be put in your organisation, as something beautiful, spiritual and cultural from the Land of the Snows, Tibet. 

It is just a special gift as a token of my appreciation for all the good energy all of you at Findhorn are sending out to the world.

We feel uplifted and filled with gratitude having received this gift. Thank you so much.

Silke Galla

Watch this short video that tells how Findhorn began and how it has progress up until now.

Findhorn today

 Wow so beautiful… greens everywhere. Look at the cabin homes behind.

 Roof top garden, how wonderful to have one of these…

 Look at how eco-friendly this house is. The roof keeps the house warm during winter and cooling during the summer.

 University Hall arts centre in Findhorn.

I love it that the residents in Finhorn live in an area so close to Nature.

 Very nice house structure with flowers on the roof.

 The ‘Original Caravan’ this was the caravan that housed the founders of Findhorn in the 1960s.

 Stone structured houses… very creative.

 Barrel houses at The Park in Findhorn.

 A house in the middle of the wilderness… so beautiful.

Another beautiful house surrounded by flowers.

 Look at how much they’ve grown over the past 30 years…

The 40 pound cabbage that was produced from the once barren land in Findhorn.

Pictures of beautiful Findhorn (Extracted from http://www.findhorn.org/)

Dorothy Maclean (top left), Peter Caddy (bottom left, and Eileen Caddy (right): The founders of Findhorn Community in 1962.

Findhorn in the 1970s

Original caravan in the early 1960s

The first home to go in.

The community landscaping Pineridge.

 Creating Bag End.

Community centre in progress.

The beginning of the Field of Dreams.

Peter Caddy digging in the gardens.

History of Finhorn  

In the early days.

The Findhorn Community was begun in 1962 by Peter and Eileen Caddy and Dorothy Maclean. All three had followed disciplined spiritual paths for many years. They first came to northeast Scotland in 1957 to manage the Cluny Hill Hotel in the town of Forres, which they did remarkably successfully. Eileen received guidance in her meditations from an inner divine source she called ‘the still small voice within’ and Peter ran the hotel according to this guidance and his own intuition. In this unorthodox way – and with many delightful and unlikely incidents – Cluny Hill swiftly became a thriving and successful four-star hotel. After several years however, Peter and Eileen’s employment was terminated, and with nowhere to go and little money, they moved with their three young sons and Dorothy to a caravan in the nearby seaside village of Findhorn.

Feeding six people on unemployment benefit was difficult, so Peter decided to start growing vegetables. The land in the caravan park was sandy and dry but he persevered. Dorothy discovered she was able to intuitively contact the overlighting spirits of plants – which she called angels, and then devas – who gave her instructions on how to make the most of their fledgling garden. She and Peter translated this guidance into action, and with amazing results. From the barren sandy soil of the Findhorn Bay Caravan Park grew huge plants, herbs and flowers of dozens of kinds, most famously the now-legendary 40-pound cabbages. Word spread, horticultural experts came and were stunned, and the garden at Findhorn became famous.

In 1970 a young American spiritual teacher named David Spangler arrived in the community and with his partner Myrtle Glines helped to define and organise the spiritual development processes that have been a central pillar of the Findhorn community ever since. A programme of learning was established and the ‘University of Light’ began. David and Myrtle lived in the community for three years, during which Findhorn Press published many of David’s visionary writings. Today we run almost 200 week-long workshops every year as well as conferences, events and our busy Outreach programme of workshops taken around the world by our workshop leaders.

A community is born

Other people came to join the Caddys and Dorothy in their work and soon the original group of six grew into a small community, committed to their spiritual path and to expanding the garden in harmony with nature. A slim volume of Eileen’s guidance entitled God Spoke To Me was published in 1967 by the community’s newly formed Findhorn Press and word of this strange but wonderful community spread yet further. Significant friends and supporters of the community in these early days included English new age pioneer Sir George Trevelyan, scottish esotericist R Ogilvie Crombie and Richard St Barbe Baker, ‘the man of the trees’. New community members lived in caravans beside Peter and Eileen’s and in specially built cedarwood bungalows which still house guests and workshop participants today. In the late 60s the Park Sanctuary, the largest of our meditation sanctuaries, and the Community Centre, where the community still eats and meets, were built by Peter and community members in accordance with Eileen’s guidance.

In 1972 the community was formally registered as a Scottish Charity under the name The Findhorn Foundation and in the 1970s and 80s grew to approximately 300 members. In 1975 the Foundation purchased Cluny Hill Hotel as a centre for its workshops and for members’ accommodation, renaming it Cluny Hill College. In the late 70s the Universal Hall, our centre for the arts, was built by volunteers. Behind its fantastic stained glass facade are housed a modern theatre and concert hall, a holistic café, dance and recording studios, and offices.

The Ecovillage

Throughout the 1970s and 80s further volumes of Eileen’s and Dorothy’s guidance were published including Eileen’s best seller, Opening Doors Within, a collection of daily inspirations which has been translated into more than 30 languages. Dorothy’s autobiography, To Hear The Angels Sing, was published in 1980, and a further autobiography, Memoirs of An Ordinary Mystic, was published in 2010. In 1982 the Foundation bought its home, the Findhorn Bay Caravan Park. Also acquired in the 1980s were neighbouring Cullerne House, whose gardens became the centre of organic vegetable production, and Drumduan House in Forres, where community members established the Moray Steiner School. Eileen’s autobiography, Flight Into Freedom, was published in 1989.

At the end of the 1980s, the Ecovillage Project at Findorn was begun, with an energy producing wind generator and the first of our eco-friendly buildings. An ecovillage is defined as being sustainable ecologically, economically, culturally and spiritually, and for us this is a logical continuation of our work with nature. Our original caravans are being gradually phased out as new cutting-edge eco-houses are built to the highest standards in many practical and beautiful designs. There are now 90 ecological buildings, and in the mid 1990s our biological sewage treatment plant, The Living Machine, was opened. We are part of the rapidly growing Global Ecovillage Network which links ecovillage projects worldwide.

In 1997 the Foundation was recognised as an official Non-Governmental Organisation associated with the Department of Public Information of United Nations, and actively participates in a variety of UN events.

In the 1990s the community began to expand beyond the Findhorn Foundation in a new way, as many people came to live nearby, attracted to the Foundation, or decided to settle nearby after leaving their work with the Foundation. The community of people living nearby to the Foundation began to outgrow the Foundation itself. Today the Findhorn Foundation is the heart of a widely diversified community of several hundred people, spanning dozens of holistic businesses and initiatives, all linked by a shared positive vision for humanity and the earth, and a commitment to the deep and practical non-doctrinal spirituality established in the Findhorn community by its founders.

Peter Caddy left the community in 1979 to work internationally. He came back to visit Findhorn regularly until his death in Germany in 1994. Peter’s autobiography, In Perfect Timing, was published in 1997. Eileen Caddy lived a long and inspiring life in the community and died peacefully at home in 2006. Dorothy Maclean, having lived in North America for a number of years and been actively involved in leading workshops around the world, has returned to Findhorn and lives in the Community.

Thousands of people who have lived here have taken what they have experienced at Findhorn out into the wider world. They are workshop leaders, authors, economists, scientists, artists, IT specialists, film makers, ecologists and all kinds of ordinary people living a conscious, holistic-based life. We are also blessed with tens of thousands of friends and supporters around the globe, who further extend our network of light, including our supporters network and Resource People. In addition the Findhorn Foundation has over a hundred Fellows, individuals whom we honour and appreciate for their transformative work in the world and their connections to our community. 

Over 34 years ago I heard about this book and bought it. I voraciously read it over a few times and was entranced. I wanted so much to live in such a community and devote my life to spiritual practice. I wished it so much. I wanted to be in Findhorn or something like Findhorn like a Tibetan Monastery. This was the exact book I read and it had a positive impact on me.

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If you are in the United States, please note that your offerings and contributions are tax deductible. ~ the tsemrinpoche.com blog team