I think during my lifetime … i’ve been annoyed one million times. I was annoyed of lots of people and the circumstances created by them … and many times … my reactions were really ugly. I’ve blamed everyone. On and on and on. And even if i knew that it was all a reflection … when it came about my own life … i was blind and could not accept such a theory. I was living 2 parallel lives … one where i was a theoretician that is analyzing and defining life …. and one living on the scene of my real life … where i was ignoring all i was doing in the first life. It was a total nonsense to have 2 lives in the same time … instead of mixing them .. and trying to create a hybrid version for my existence. There were moments when i was laughing of myself … of how silly i was … but … Well … i was blind. I count not connect the 2 realities. I could not be … just one. It was like i had … 2 souls inside of me … which was probably the most ridiculous idea i could come with. But …. time was passing … and i was starting to understand… what was wrong. I had indeed … 2 souls. One was the self … the real one, the one connected with the Universe … and the other one was …. my ego … my fake self … which looked all the time … so damn real. I continued my life … balancing. On and on …. and on. In fact i was not applying my spiritual knowledge to my own life … and i kept being annoyed. No matter how good the curent reality was … i always found a reason … not to be satisfied … or even continue being unhappy. It was like i was ignoring … even perfect case scenarios. Well … in both of my parallel lives … i was analyzing a lot …. all around myself … but as a thinker i was looking at everything with detachment … and on the scene of reality … i was treating everything … as real. There was no … detachment. I had to mix my 2 personalities … and become just one. It was ok that i was analyzing everything and everyone … but i had to stop judging and most important to ignore … or at least to pretend i don’t see the dark side of all was going on. I had to stop being annoyed. I had this freedom of exploring souls … but i had to learn to practice … the acceptance. Being annoyed … was so, so stupid of me … cause i was annoyed of … my own reflection. … of what i disliked on myself. Exploring deeply the world and all the souls i was seeing on the scene of reality … was ok. But … the wisest thing i could do … was to let my 2 parallel lives to interfere. Apply the spiritual principles into the real life. Forget about the illusion … of myself.

"Most of us will have many friends throughout our lifetimes—friends of all shapes, sizes, and callings. Many of these are wonderful, meaningful friendships. Some are difficult. But some magic few of these are connections that have gone right to our soul. These five or seven or ten friendships have been powerful keys to determining who we have become and who we will become. . . . These are the people I call Soul Friends." As the Senior Scholar-in-Residence for over 25 years at the renowned Kripalu Center, Stephen Cope has spent decades investigating—and writing about—the integration of body, mind, and spirit and the rich complexity of our relationships with others, and with ourselves. Perhaps the central truth that arises from his work is this: human beings are universally wired for one thing—vital connection with one another.Soul Friends invites us on a compelling journey into the connectivity of the human psyche, the study of which has fascinated scholars, philosophers, and thinkers for centuries. Cope seamlessly blends science, scholarship, and storytelling, drawing on his own life as well as the histories of famous figures—from Eleanor Roosevelt to Charles Darwin to Queen Victoria—whose formative relationships shed light on the nature of friendship itself. In his exploration, he distills human connection into six distinct yet interconnected mechanisms: containment, twinship, adversity, mirroring, identification, and conscious partnership. Then he invites us to reflect on how these forms of connection appear in our own lives, helping us work toward a fuller understanding of "who we have become and who we will become."Without a doubt, the journey to our most fulfilled selves requires us to look within. But in order to truly thrive, we must make the most of who we are in relation to one another as well. Unsparingly honest, deeply wise, and irresistibly readable, Soul Friends gives us a map to find our way.

"It would be naive to suppose that intelligent life exists only on Earth. Dr. Linda Backman's groundbreaking book offers credible evidence of evolved interplanetary souls incarnate in human bodies. Souls on Earth presents a critical understanding of the gifts and challenges of such advanced beings."—Larry Dossey, MD, author of One Mind Discover the profound truth about interplanetary souls—people whose previous lives were experienced on distant planets or in other dimensions. In her work as a regression hypnotherapist, Dr. Linda Backman frequently meets with individuals who have had past lives on planets and realms beyond Earth. These individuals—called interplanetary souls—have agreed to come to Earth to help support the evolution of the planet as well as to develop themselves and learn lessons for spiritual advancement. In Souls on Earth, Dr. Backman shares her fascinating work with interplanetary souls. This book explores the characteristics of interplanetary souls so that if you are one, you will be able to understand more about your life purpose and cope with the special challenges that come with an incarnation on Earth. Learn how to identify IP souls and discover how they can assist humanity's evolution. Explore ways to support yourself or loved ones who may be IP souls. For many people struggling with difficult lessons or trying to find meaning, this book opens the door to new understandings and the potential for peace. Praise: "Based upon data from case studies gathered across decades in more than ten thousand soul regressions, Dr. Backman describes our soul energy as a light frequency, as our luminous body, and reveals that from our first incarnation, our divine soul light initiates a long-term and profound climb toward higher wisdom. In this book, we discover that each of us arrives on Earth with a two-fold evolutionary purpose: To progress our individual soul and to holistically advance life on Earth."—Hank Wesselman, PhD, author of The Spiritwalker Trilogy and the award-winning Awakening to the Spirit World (with Sandra Ingerman) "Souls on Earth by Linda Backman is a fascinating book filled with a grounded presentation and case studies that share a wealth of information and insights into the different dimensions of reality and wisdom brought to Earth by incarnate interplanetary souls. This is a wonderfully written and thought-provoking book!"—Sandra Ingerman, MA, author of Soul Retrieval and Walking in Light "Nothing clears the mind and body as well as Past Life Therapy. Wherever you are on your soul evolution path, this is the way to integration of everything."—C. Norman Shealy, MD, PhD, founder and CEO of International Institute of Holistic Medicine, president of Shealy Wellness, cofounder of the American Board of Scientific Medical Intuition, and author of Conversations with G: A Physician's Encounter with Heaven "As someone who has extensive experience studying the evolution of the soul, I highly applaud Linda Backman for her dedication and courage in taking us on a fantastic voyage through time and space in her groundbreaking book Souls on Earth."—Kim Russo, psychic medium, intuitive counselor, and host of Psychic Intervention and The Haunting Of...

Finalist for the National Book Award for Nonfiction * New York Times Bestseller * A Huffington Post Notable Nonfiction Book of the Year * One of the Best Books of the Month on Goodreads * Library Journal Best Sci-Tech Book of the Year * An American Library Association Notable Book of the Year “Sy Montgomery’s The Soul of an Octopus does for the creature what Helen Macdonald’s H Is for Hawk did for raptors.” —New Statesman, UK “One of the best science books of the year.” —Science Friday, NPR Another New York Times bestseller from the author of The Good Good Pig, this “fascinating…touching…informative…entertaining” (The Daily Beast) book explores the emotional and physical world of the octopus—a surprisingly complex, intelligent, and spirited creature—and the remarkable connections it makes with humans. In pursuit of the wild, solitary, predatory octopus, popular naturalist Sy Montgomery has practiced true immersion journalism. From New England aquarium tanks to the reefs of French Polynesia and the Gulf of Mexico, she has befriended octopuses with strikingly different personalities—gentle Athena, assertive Octavia, curious Kali, and joyful Karma. Each creature shows her cleverness in myriad ways: escaping enclosures like an orangutan; jetting water to bounce balls; and endlessly tricking companions with multiple “sleights of hand” to get food. Scientists have only recently accepted the intelligence of dogs, birds, and chimpanzees but now are watching octopuses solve problems and are trying to decipher the meaning of the animal’s color-changing techniques. With her “joyful passion for these intelligent and fascinating creatures” (Library Journal Editors’ Spring Pick), Montgomery chronicles the growing appreciation of this mollusk as she tells a unique love story. By turns funny, entertaining, touching, and profound, The Soul of an Octopus reveals what octopuses can teach us about the meeting of two very different minds.

A young interfaith chaplain is joined on her hospital rounds one night by an unusual companion: a rough-and-tumble dog who may or may not be a ghost. As she tends to the souls of her patients—young and old, living last moments or navigating fundamentally altered lives—their stories provide unexpected healing for her own heartbreak. Balancing wonder and mystery with pragmatism and humor, Ellen Cooney (A Mountaintop School for Dogs and Other Second Chances) returns to Coffee House Press with a generous, intelligent novel that grants the most challenging moments of the human experience a shimmer of light and magical possibility.

Edited by Mark R. McMinn and Timothy R. Phillips, this collection of essays is a multidisciplinary dialogue on the interface between psychology and theology that takes seriously the long, rich tradition of soul care in the church.

Every day millions of Tamil women in southeast India wake up before dawn to create a kolam, an ephemeral ritual design made with rice flour, on the thresholds of homes, businesses and temples. This thousand-year-old ritual welcomes and honors Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth and alertness, and Bhudevi, the goddess of the earth. Created by hand with great skill, artistry, and mathematical precision, the kolam disappears in a few hours, borne away by passing footsteps and hungry insects. This is the first comprehensive study of the kolam in the English language. It examines its significance in historical, mathematical, ecological, anthropological, and literary contexts. The culmination of Vijaya Nagarajan's many years of research and writing on this exacting ritual practice, Feeding a Thousand Souls celebrates the experiences, thoughts, and voices of the Tamil women who keep this tradition alive.