Each year, the Kindred Spirit Awards celebrate those who make a positive difference in our lives. We've seen another year of wonderful work in the world of Mind, Body and Spirit, and this year you voted in your thousands to decide who would take away the awards in each category. The votes have been counted and the results are in... find out more about who has won in each category this year and why you voted for them.
This year's winner in the Lifetime Achievement category is Satish Kumar, a peace and environmental activist who is also the UK's longest-serving editor of the same magazine.
Lifetime Achievement Award: Satish Kumar
A former monk and long-term peace and environmental activist, Satish Kumar has been quietly setting the Global Agenda for change for over 50 years. He was just nine when he left his family home to join the wandering Jains and 18 when he decided he could achieve more back in the world, campaigning for land reform in India and working to turn Gandhi’s vision of a renewed India and a peaceful world into reality.
Inspired in his early 20s by the example of the British peace activist Bertrand Russell, Satish embarked on an 8,000-mile peace pilgrimage together with E.P. Menon. Carrying no money and depending on the kindness and hospitality of strangers, they walked from India to America, via Moscow, London and Paris, to deliver a humble packet of ‘peace tea’ to the then leaders of the world’s four nuclear powers.
In 1973 Satish settled in the United Kingdom and took up the post of editor of Resurgence magazine, a position he held until 2014, making him the UK’s longest-serving editor of the same magazine. During this time, he was the guiding spirit behind a number of now internationally-respected ecological and educational ventures including Schumacher College in South Devon where he is still a Visiting Fellow.
Satish is on the Advisory Board of Our Future Planet, a unique online community sharing ideas for real change and in recognition of his commitment to animal welfare and compassionate living, he was recently elected vice-president with the RSPCA. He continues to teach and run workshops on reverential ecology, holistic education and voluntary simplicity and is a much sought-after speaker both in the UK and abroad.
