Satish Kumar's Serene Spirituality

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Seeing the universe flowing in cycles rather than following a path of linear progression, Satish believes that spiritual consciousness eventually will replace, or at least counterbalance, modern consciousness. "Modernity is very powerful," he admits. "It has the media, the corporations. Yet there seems to be a discontentedness in many people today, despite all the glamour and achievement and technology and wealth. There is a sense of the loss of meaning."

Satish freely acknowledges that he chooses to live in the modern world and knows it is not always easy to resist its pull. That's why—no matter how urgent the duties of the day—he spends two hours every morning meditating, chanting, and reading, and takes a walk every day with June and sometimes with their daughter, Maya, 21, a college student studying philosophy, and son, Mukti, 25, a filmmaker and sailing crewman. (Both Maya and Mukti work on the magazine when they are at home.) It is also why Resurgence is published in Hartland, an out-of-the-way farming village on England's Devon coast.

"Out of my office window I can look at black currants, red currants, plums, apples, greengays, quinces, and raspberries growing in the courtyard," Satish says. "After a morning of editing we go to the garden and pick vegetables for lunch. When it's a beautiful sunny day, we'll say, 'Let's go outside. No editing today.'

"People tell us we are very inefficient and naïve," he adds, a sly grin crossing his face. "I say yes, we are inefficient and naïve, but we are happy. You keep your efficiency and we'll keep our happiness."

I ask Satish if he ever gets discouraged about changing the world. Don't things like regular rumbles from the supersonic Concorde show the invincible power of modern consciousness? "Spiritual consciousness holds that the world is sacred," he answers firmly. "We must celebrate it rather than just try to improve it. Take joy in what's here. Outcome is not the point; we must do what is right."

Two years ago Satish turned 60, an age that many Indians mark by renouncing worldliness, giving away their possessions, and retreating to a mountaintop. Satish has no such plans. He says he's content with his life exactly as it is, that he's accomplished all he ever hoped for. But then, scratching his goatee and wiggling a bit in the kitchen chair, he admits that he has thought of writing a book about spiritual consciousness and ecology. Moments later, he adds that if he could ever find the time, he'd love to revive the 19th-century Arts and Crafts movement, which celebrated fine craftsmanship, humane working conditions, and simple, unadorned beauty in architecture and everyday objects.

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