Embracing Our Essence

by Skog, Susan

• ISBN13: 9781558743786
• ISBN10: 1558743782
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1995-10-01
• Publisher: Hci

Summary

Jane Goodall - Betty Ford - Sophy Burnham - Joan Borysenko - Elisabeth Kubler-Ross - Naomi Judd - Marian Wright Edelman - Ardath Rodale - Betty Eadie - Rachel Naomi Remen - Christiane Northup Millions of us are embracing--or may be on the verge of just discovering-- our spiritual essence: our intuitiveness, wisdom, resilience and compassion. In the first shining collection of its kind, 29 prominent women of our time intimately share the philosophies, practices, touchstones and struggles that shape their lives. They discuss the source of the pulsing spirituality sweeping our country--and why it's our only hope for personal fulfillment and evolution as a society. As doctors, poets, psychologists, publishers, teachers, anthropologists and mothers, they show us how we can discover deeper meaning in our lives and lasting peace in our hearts and souls. Valuable solace to women and men discovering their own spiritual strength, this insightful collection speaks directly to that deep place inside all of us that yearns to love, connect and grow in goodness.

Excerpts

Introduction Our spirituality is our opening to one another as whole human beings, each different and precious, and our exploring how we can truly learn to love. Jean Grasso FitzpatrickWomen ablaze with spiritual goodness and purpose are transforming and healing our world as never before. Millions of us are embracing or may be just on the verge of discovering our spiritual essence our intuitiveness, wisdom, resilience and compassion. We are awakening from a spirit-less somnolence to see our relationships, society, environment, children, institutions and, most important, ourselves in a startling new spiritual context. Infused, even exhilarated with our individual and collective abilities to shine, we finally see we can indeed create a new world. We don't have to wait for the ubiquitous ""them"" to do something. We are ""them,"" and we are already deep into shaping a more loving and humane reality. At the same time, we fully realize the only way we can carve out this courageous new existence is by first nourishing our very souls. A rich new external world must spring from our lush interiors. We must lay a loving foundation in our own hearts and spirits before we can build soulful communities around us. Anything else is an illusion. We see greater spirituality, then, as our only hope for soul satisfaction and our society's best hope for evolution. Which is why, after years of seeking solace in worldly distractions, shallow relationships, career kudos and materialistic binges, unprecedented numbers of us are on full-blown inner quests, knowing fully that we will encounter unfamiliar, even terrifying territory. For our spiritual growth is inevitably linked to intensely personal, often painful awakenings. We begin to awaken as we admire our meticulously decorated homes and whisper, ""There has to be something more."" One day, as we watch our children sleep, or smell the air after a rainstorm or get a dreaded prognosis about our health we sense our souls irreparably shift. We can almost feel our souls gasp as something new is born. And in that soul-shift, we feel an intense connection to something greater than ourselves and a new, raw concern for humanity everywhere. As German mystic Meister Eckhart said, ""Whatever God does, the first outburst is always compassion."" We feel alternately electrified and humbled by the palpable sense that we are exquisitely wrought, lovingly planned and molded for a Divine purpose. We have been sent here with gifts of insight, talents, goodness and light to create a better world.When did my own spiritual stirrings begin? When did I first sense the world in a different, deeper way? Much of it began growing up in the magical Iowa countryside, in a child's ultimate delight of dense woods, streams running with crayfish and guppies, and bushes heavy with raspberries and gooseberries. In a world where towering oaks, maples, hickories and locusts gave life to my dreams and dance to my imaginat

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Excerpted from Embracing Our Essence: Spiritual Conversations with Prominent Women by Susan Skog
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