Apart from being a monk, I have, of course, also had a past. Most people do.
Before ending up here, I had already lived several different lives. In my youth I sang in a punk band. Later I became an actor and spent some thirty-five years on stage. I also directed theatre, taught at the Academy of Fine Arts in Helsinki, and somehow found myself becoming a Gestalt therapist and working with groups for almost forty years.
Along the way, I have had four horses, two dogs, four children and two wives.
So life has rarely suffered from a lack of entertainment.
It has also not always been easy.
My mother died of cancer when I was nine, and my father took his own life when I was eleven. After that I lived with my aunt, who died suddenly when I was thirteen. Fortunately, my brother was six years older than me, and somehow we managed.
So my childhood was, shall we say, rather unconventional.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, I carried quite a lot of anxiety, depression and existential uncertainty into adult life. Much of my life became an impressive collection of survival strategies, and acting was certainly one of them.
Whatever I happened to feel, however disastrous my inner weather was, I could usually put it to some use on stage.
Suffering is not something I would recommend, but it does sometimes give an artist a certain depth. At the very least, it provides street credibility.
Professionally, I was fortunate. Privately, life was considerably more complicated.
Eventually I discovered Gestalt therapy. For three years I participated in groups with a wonderful therapist, and those years opened a door into a completely new world — the world of inner experience, awareness and human connection.
After those three years, I felt that something fundamental had changed and that life had become much lighter. But I also sensed that there were still a few stones to turn over, so I began training at Gestalt Institute International in Denmark.
I had no intention whatsoever of becoming a therapist. I was quite happy being an actor. I simply wanted to dig a little deeper into myself.
So, in a way, I became a Gestalt therapist almost by mistake.
People started asking if they could work with me, groups gradually became another important part of my life, and after finishing my training I somehow ended up teaching at the institute for about ten years.
Even today, I don’t really identify myself as a therapist.
Nor as an actor.
Nor even as a monk.
These are simply things life has asked me to do.
Eight years ago I made what was perhaps the best decision of my life.
It was not a sudden decision. For many years I had carried with me the old Indian idea that life has different stages: first we grow up and find our place in the world, then we take care of the business of living, and finally we turn towards the spiritual life and prepare ourselves for the last and only journey we have to make.
I had known for a long time that this was the direction I wanted my own life to take.
So when the time felt right, I left behind my acting career and ordinary lay life and moved into a Zen training monastery.
For five years I lived a life of simplicity and discipline. We meditated for five hours every day, and attendance was not optional. When the bell rang, you went to meditate.
You could be tired. You could be uninspired. You could have a thousand reasons why today was not the perfect day for meditation.
But you went.
Your own funeral might possibly have been accepted as a reasonable excuse.
Although I can smile about the strictness now, I look back on those years with enormous gratitude. The discipline was exactly what I needed, and behind the strict schedule were some of the kindest people I have known. The chef in particular was a true bodhisattva in an apron.
Those years were also among the most challenging of my life.
I have bipolar disorder, which became increasingly difficult as I grew older. During those years I tried different treatments, some of which unfortunately made meditation even more difficult. There were periods when simply sitting down on the cushion and staying there was already a considerable practice.
Quite early during my time in the Zen monastery, I realised that although I deeply respected Zen, my heart was moving in another direction. I felt increasingly drawn towards the Theravāda tradition.
Watching Theravāda monks, I noticed something that touched me deeply. They seemed to carry a quality I had been searching for my whole life.
Peace.
Not just knowledge. Not just philosophy.
Simply a radiant peace.
Eventually I found a Theravāda monastery in Estonia and joined a three-month winter retreat as a temporary monk.
Then, on an ordinary morning, while sitting in meditation as I had done countless times before, something happened that changed everything.
A deep peace appeared.
It was followed by happiness without any apparent reason. Then came such powerful joy that I found myself sitting there laughing for what must have been an hour or more.
It was beautiful.
It was completely unexpected.
And, to be honest, rather confusing.
But the real miracle was not the experience itself.
The real miracle was that it stayed.
For the past two years, that quiet happiness and peace have been with me every day. The anxiety, distress and constant worries that accompanied me for decades are simply not there anymore.
I still have bipolar disorder. It is a chronic condition and I still take my basic medication. I don’t consider myself cured, enlightened or anything particularly special. But since that morning I have experienced almost no symptoms.
Every morning I wake with a feeling of gratitude and happiness that I still find difficult to explain.
It feels as though I have been given a second chance in life.
And that is why I want to share this with you.
I know there is a way out of suffering. I know it from my own experience.
If anything, my life has been a rather unlikely advertisement for the possibility of change.
With an overactive mind, a complicated history, a few deep-rooted habits, some unfinished business and enough underlying conditions for a couple of lifetimes, I was not exactly the most obvious candidate for discovering profound peace.
And yet, somehow, it happened.
That is why I share this — not to present myself as an example of perfection, but as an example of hope and possibility.
If someone like me can find a way from anxiety and despair towards peace, happiness and quiet joy, why not you?
There is light at the end of the tunnel.
And fortunately, it is not necessarily a train.
I cannot promise that anyone else’s path will look like mine.
Actually, I rather hope it doesn’t.
Everyone has their own journey.
But I have seen enough to believe that peace is much closer than most of us imagine.
Underneath all the roles I have played — actor, therapist, teacher, monk — I suspect I am simply an ordinary human being trying, like everyone else, to understand this strange and beautiful adventure called life.
If you would like to know more about my journey and my thoughts on therapy, meditation and the spiritual path, there is an essay elsewhere on this website.
I should warn you that it is rather long and occasionally has a tendency to explain the same thing several times.
On the other hand, I have placed a few jokes here and there to reward those who make it all the way through.
For the present moment, my path is very simple. It consists of two things: sitting in my small hermitage on the hill, together with some fellow monks, practising meditation and enjoying the peace, happiness and quiet joy that life has given me; and sharing with others the possibility that such peace might also be found within themselves.
I don’t miss anything.
I don’t search for anything.
Except, of course, dark chocolate, red wine and a good cheese every now and then.
But otherwise, I am quite happily content with life as it is.
And perhaps that is the greatest gift of all.
