Bowie on Buddhism, ETs, art: Life on Mars

David Bowie talks the internet, Buddhism, and space aliens | MTV

(MTV News) In this full MTV News 1997 interview, superstar David Bowie (davidbowie.com) discusses how the internet and Buddhism guides his work.

On second thought, I shoulda become a monk

As a teen, he intended to become a Buddhist monk, a lama in a Vajrayana temple in Europe, but his rinpoche saw that he was more interested in music and was better off pursuing his art rather than cloistering himself in a temple, which would have certainly helped him more in life while depriving the world of his songs. But he pursued an interest in Zen until a Zen master in Kyoto told him that [organized] religion is over and that it [the future] lies in the [visual and musical] arts. Are there aliens [other beings such as devas] in space? Bowie's interest is not in the hardware of UFOs, the corporeal reality of such beings, but rather their existence only ever represented spiritual search, more a metaphor for the otherness, isolation, and alienation. "But the idea, 'Is there life on Mars?' I could care less."

• 0:04 David Bowie on music via the internet
• 0:21 Aging and his album sales
• 1:22 The potential of the internet
• 3:17 Spirituality and Buddhism
• 5:25 Bowie on the Dalai Lama
• 6:15 Organized religion and the arts
• 9:04 Bowie's opinion on ETs, space aliens

"Religion is over and it lies in the arts" - David Bowie on life’s purpose

I was once a shy conservative boy

(T&H - Inspiration & Motivation) This is a collection of profound and powerful messages on life's purpose by David Bowie (1947-2016) in honor of his genius. “I don’t know where I’m going from here, but I promise it won’t be boring,” Bowie stated. Gnosticism is a better approach to spirituality and religion than our Judeo-Christian background. Celebrities by T&H Motivation and Inspiration

• David Bowie, 1/10/17; MTV, 1997; Seth Auberon, Shauna Schwartz (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly