Wednesday, March 27, 2019

A Sneak Peek Inside Drewsilla The Shelter Puppy by Karen Carew Oakes



DREWSILLA THE SHELTER PUPPY by Karen Carew Oakes, Children's Picture Book, 22 pp., $16.64 (paperback) $3.03 (Kindle)



When Drewsilla and her siblings are tiny puppies, an accident steals their mother away. A kind stranger rescues them and takes them to a shelter, where the staff works around the clock to care for the pack of newborns. Soon, her brothers and sisters begin to thrive. Drewsilla has a beautiful black coat, intelligent eyes, and ears that stand straight up.

Drewsilla, though, is scared. She seems afraid of everyone and everything and hides in the back of her cage when families come to visit. As her friendly siblings each get adopted, lonely Drewsilla remains. The staff even worries that she might never find a home. Then, one day, something amazing happens.

The Johnsons come to the shelter to look at another dog and see Drewsilla, who miraculously finds the courage to stop hiding and say hello. All shelter dogs deserve the chance to find a loving family, and this is the true story of Drewsilla — how she overcomes her fears, finds her family, and gets a second chance at a happy life.

ORDER YOUR COPY:

______________________




Then one day, the Johnsons came to the shelter. They had looked on the shelter website for available dogs they wanted to see.  Drewsilla, was not one of them. It just so happened that they would have to pass directly in front of Drewsilla’s cage. As they passed something amazing happened. Drewsilla came to the front, stood on her hind legs, poked her nose out of the bars, and begged for attention. Mrs. Johnson bent over to see her. It was love at first sight. The Johnsons asked to open the cage so they could see her.





Karen Carew Oakes, has been writing for many years and her articles have been included in the Lutheran Advent, as well as an article in several magazines. She is a mother and grandmother. She lives in Helotes, Texas with her two schnauzers Ella and Mackenzie. Her stories are based on true experiences her children encountered growing up.

Visit her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/karencarewoakes.




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A Sneak Peek into Running From Demons by M.K. Theodoratus


RUNNING FROM DEMONS by M.K. Theodoratus, Paranormal Fantasy, 430 pp., $2.99 (Kindle)

Title: RUNNING FROM DEMONS
Author: M.K. Theodoratus
Publisher: Independent
Pages: 279
Genre: Paranormal/Fantasy

Pillar Beccon travels across Andor to discover her mother’s mysterious past. But danger is never far away as a demon seeks to destroy her.

An orphaned null without a hint of magic, Pillar can’t remember ever belonging anywhere, especially not in the Freemage commune where she grew up. After she graduates from high school, she jumps at the chance to learn why her mother ran away from her family.

During an accidental encounter, Grylerrque, a surviving commander from The Demon Wars, recognizes what Pillar is and decides to feed the girl’s life force to her clutch. The demon sends her minions to capture the girl. Pillar escapes with a help of an unexpected allay, only to learn she was pulled out of the frying pan and thrown into the fire.

Link to book on Amazon:  https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07GVQM3VV
Link to book on B&N: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/running-from-demons-m-k-theodoratus/1129405241




Pillar Beccon stood before the open doors of the Taddledon bus
station, steeling her nerves. She was alone with no one at her back,
not even her running buds from school. Though, now that "Te Tres
Amigas" had graduated, she'd have to get used to being alone again.
Pillar's jaw clenched as she braced herself against the coming stares.
The teen didn’t mind the double takes as she walked along a
street. They seldom pierced the walls she’d built around herself. Inside the Taddledon Station, she’d be the pale-skinned, weird-eared
weirdo caught in a sea of tan people sneaking glances at her angular,
mismatched face, wispy blond hair, and super tall height. People always gawked at her. She felt lucky when they didn’t drool when their
mouths hung open. Pillar begged the Powers for strength, not that
they ever helped nulls or mages.
Get a grip. At least they won’t tease you like the kids at school. They
don't know you're a nothing null. Pillar refused to admit she was neither human nor mage, fsh nor fowl. Besides, odds are the people waiting're only human and aren't aware.
The hair on the back of her neck prickled. When she scanned
the station, nothing around her felt threatening. You're over-reacting.
You're safe. Pillar sighed with relief. I didn’t let Delia down. I made the
test trip on my own. No glitches.

The teen had survived the day trip to the Taddledon museum
and gardens in spite of her foster mother's worries. Pillar didn't need
babysitting by the Freemage commune that had taken her in when
her mother died. Not that her mother was a born member. Mages
thought the mountain communes the only safe place for their young
since their teens made the perfect prey for demon-kind—if her yapping trainers weren't just blowing hot air. She stood taller, and her
shoulders relaxed.
Satisfaction flooded through her. I made it.
The bumblebee drone of the milling travelers bounced o the
high ceilings and washed over her. Here and there, children’s shrieks
drew scowls as they spiked above the noise. All seemed to ignore
the announcement that a bus had just arrived at the platforms. The
prickles grew sharper, and she paused.
After a glance around the lobby, Pillar guessed most were locals
returning to their surrounding small towns after shopping trips to
the big city. Te few roamers, marked by their grubby clothes and
backpacks, might be mages or might not be. Communes and towns
tended to throw out their misfits after they graduated from high
school if they didn't get admitted to colleges or tech schools.
A man near the outside door sat, slumped back on a bench and
eyes closed, with his hands resting on his ample belly. He opened one
eye and jerked. His gaze darted away from Pillar’s icy, challenging
stare, made all the colder by her pale blue eyes. A flush rushed over
his face as he ducked his head.
It’s not like I’m a total freak. All mages have long faces.
Pillar hunched her shoulders again but decided not to get pissed
o or feel sorry for herself. Both reactions were a waste of energy. Pillar ignored thousands of memories of being told nobody wanted a
null, not even the Kingscourt, unless the null was brilliant enough
to become a useful functionary. Nulls were kicked out of mage communes to fend for themselves in the slums of the cities.
RUNNING FROM DEMONS 3
Swallowing, Pillar reached out with her new, weak awareness to
a static-like buzz along her skin created by the people around her. For
her, the fluttering ambience of the station tickled rather than buzzed.
She shook her head and strode towards the end of the station's diner.
Her stomach growled its approval.
Thoughts of a toasted cheese sandwich made her mouth water.
Her always hungry stomach spurred her forward, but a jarring undercurrent sprang out from under the normal human buzz. The atmosphere of the station suddenly smelled o, like curdled milk.
Pausing again to size up the waiting travelers, Pillar chewed on
her lip. Everyone felt normally human to her. No one displayed any
obvious mage powers unless the hint of static was coming from the
security guard, a Kingscourt flunky, who would possess at least some
low-grade magic. The guarda stood alert, scanning the station with a
wary gaze.
As the waitress approached her, she chewed a wad of gum so
large her tongue appeared each time her jaw moved. Pillar lowered
her eyes at the unattractive sight, retreating into her shell rather
than feel the waitress’s turbulent emotions. But waitress's gaze rested
on Pillar’s long narrow face with its wider than normal mouth and
knife-like nose. A flash of pity crossed her roundish face. Pillar sat
straighter and smiled, revealing as many teeth as possible.
“Ham and cheese with extra cheese, please,” said Pillar.
“Cost you extra.”
Pillar almost rolled her eyes, but she had learned to contain her
reactions, much to her foster mother/mentor’s relief. “So add it to
my bill.” The waitress clomped towards the kitchen window of the
grill, writing on her pad.
Piercing shrieks echoed o the high ceilings. Pillar’s head jerked
around to see three kids running away from a taller boy, who
stomped after them like a bear. He growled, making them scream
louder. Their bright auras rose and fell with their screams.
 
Looks like they’re having fun.
The game continued until one of the kids tripped over a suitcase.
Angry words erupted from an older woman. She wore a hat, ringed
with flowers, as if she were someone important, but important people didn’t take buses. They owned their own cars. The kids ignored
her just as Pillar would have.
Scanning the area, Pillar tested her developing talent for reading
auras. The slow dance of dierent shimmering colors popping
through the light bluish-green glow of their life pulse fascinated her,
but she concentrated on possible threats. Everyone in the lobby felt
like nulls to Pillar. But her eavesdropping on the mage elders, talking
to her guardian, told her they worried about magical attacks from demon-kind. While no adult talked much about them, Pillar assumed
demons could camouflage themselves and hide behind shields.
Otherwise, they wouldn’t be so hard to find. She shuddered, not
wanting to think of demons possessing people. Doubt if any demons
would dare to hunt here, anyway.
The thought comforted Pillar, and she relaxed. The waitress arrived and picked a plate o her ladened arm to plunk it on the
counter with a sigh.
Pillar smiled as the waitress scooted around the counter to the
tables against the wall. “Thanks. It looks delicious.” The waitress bustled away without looking back, and Pillar shrugged.
Not wanting to dribble cheese on the new tee she’d bought in
the museum shop, Pillar leaned forward to take a bite of her toasted
ham and cheese sandwich. The gooey cheese oozed out the sides,
over her fingers. She licked them and her lips. The cost of adding
extra cheese was worth it, making a perfect ending to her first solo
venture into Taddledon. The ride home would be dull in comparison
to the carefree day she had enjoyed. At least her stomach wouldn't be
growling.
 
The PA system belched news of another arriving bus, adding to
the racket bouncing o the station walls. The garbled words made
no sense. Pillar ignored the announcement as she licked her fingers
clean. The tenor of the air shifted. The hair on her nape rose. Pillar
glanced back towards the benches in the lobby.
Taking another bite of her gooey sandwich, Pillar licked her lips
as she searched for the disturbance in the station’s energy. The power became so intense even Pillar’s weak talent felt the rising pulse. A
chill crawled across her shoulders and down her back. Pillar turned
around. Her eyes locked on a tangled-haired girl, clutching a backpack in her hands and using the wall by the platform doors to protect
her back. The girl's eyes grew wider as she scanned the station.
Pillar's frizzy hair stood at attention. A strange odor, the like of
which she'd never smelled in Osseran, wafted from the outside doors.
Her stomach churned, and Pillar dropped her no longer appetizing
sandwich.
What's going on? That girl just doesn't feel like a normal, but she
shouldn't make my stomach want to heave.




A Northern California gal, M. K. Theodoratus has been intrigued by fantasy since she discovered comic books and the land of Oz. Some of her early favorites were A. Merritt, Andre Norton, Catherine L. Moore, and Fritz Lieber. She has traveled through many fantasy worlds since then. Now she enjoys reading Lee Child, Patricia Briggs, Sharyn McCrumb, Neil Gaiman, and Carol O’Connell among others.

When she’s not disappearing into other writer’s worlds, she’s creating her own alternative worlds — that of Andor where demons prey and that of the Far Isle Half-Elven where she explores the social and political implications of genetic drift on a hybrid elf/human people. Magic and mayhem are her favorite topics.

She now lives in Colorado with her old man and two lap cats.

Website Address:  http://www.mktheodoratus.com
Twitter Address: https://twitter.com/kaytheod
Facebook Address: https://www.facebook.com/M-K-Theodoratus-Fantasy-Writer-235376633158175/



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Monday, March 25, 2019

A Sneak Peek Inside The Brave Art of Motherhood by Rachel Marie Martin


THE BRAVE ART OF MOTHERHOOD by Rachel Marie Martin, Self-Help, 204 pp., $10.99 (paperback) $11.99 (Kindle)

Title: THE BRAVE ART OF MOTHERHOOD
Author: Rachel Marie Martin
Publisher: Random House
Pages: 204
Genre: Self-Help


Full-time FindingJoy.net blogger, speaker, marketer, podcaster, and single mom of seven, Rachel Marie Martin presents a wake-up call to those of us who have found ourselves stuck in the ‘I’m just a mom’ phase of life. 

Yes, this book is about motherhood . . . but really, this book is about finding yourself again and following your passion WHILE being a mom. Inspired by her incredible story, Rachel’s words always come straight from the gut; they are visceral, real and soul searching. She challenges you to find the courage to break cycles, to take off masks and not let fear take control. This book is a balance of tough, “no excuses” ways of approaching life, while allowing breathing room and grace for yourself, for as we all know, life and mothering are not perfect.

After inspiring and conversing with thousands of women, Rachel has surmised there is always a reason to hope, to move forward and a reason to dare doing what you thought was impossible. (Yes, including what you are skeptical of accomplishing right now). She encourages you to say yes to your dreams and stop waiting for “someday” or “one day” or “when something happens”.

Prepare to change the way you think about yourself and your life. This will be a book you read over and over armed with a highlighter in one hand and a journal for introspection in another.

ORDER YOUR COPY:

______________________




One November day, I stood at my bedroom window watching as a sharp wind stripped the remaining leaves from the trees. Seeing those limbs laid bare, I felt similarly exposed. I realized I'd been lost in my own life, waiting for something to change. But I couldn't wait any longer.

So I started fighting. Reclaiming the lifeless spaces, unearthing joy in motherhood, and finding hope and purpose. No longer did I hide behind the words "When the kids are grown, I will. . . "

I changed one thing: my mind

Now my kids are happier than they have ever been. And so am I.


 








Rachel Marie Martin believes in the power of the human spirit to overcome, to thrive and to find deep joy and because of that she pours out her heart via these platforms: she is the writer behind the site FindingJoy.net, partner of BloggingConcentrated.com, co-host of the Amplify Podcast, and a featured writer for The Huffington Post. Her top blog post, “Why Being a Mom is Enough” has surpassed 1.9 million Facebook likes and she has had her articles translated into over 25 languages. Her site reaches millions of visitors and has a robust, engaged Facebook community. Her articles have been featured in The Huffington Post, iVillage, The Today Show, Star Tribune, iVillage, Stuff New Zealand, PopSugar, Parents, What to Expect, Mamalode, NBC Parents, Dr. Greene, and many more. Her first book, “The Brave Art of Motherhood”, published by Penguin Random House, was released on October 9, 2018.

She speaks worldwide about a variety of empowering topics ranging from motherhood to social media marketing to website strategy to writing to creating an authentic community. She believes in living each day intentionally and loves working with others to cultivate a vision, realize their potential and see their dreams become a reality.

WEBSITE & SOCIAL LINKS:

WEBSITE | TWITTER | FACEBOOK





http://www.pumpupyourbook.com

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Tuesday, March 19, 2019

#BlogTour Interview with Sherry Jones, Author of Josephine Baker's Last Dance #interview #JosephineBaker @sherryjones





Author and journalist Sherry Jones is best known for her international bestseller The Jewel of Medina. She is also the author of The Sword of MedinaFour SistersAll QueensThe Sharp Hook of Love, and the novella White Heart.  Sherry lives in Spokane, WA, where, like Josephine Baker, she enjoys dancing, singing, eating, advocating for equality, and drinking champagne.
Her latest novel is Josephine Baker’s Last Dance.




From the author of The Jewel of Medina, a moving and insightful novel based on the life of legendary performer and activist Josephine Baker, perfect for fans of The Paris Wife and Hidden Figures.

Discover the fascinating and singular life story of Josephine Baker—actress, singer, dancer, Civil Rights activist, member of the French Resistance during WWII, and a woman dedicated to erasing prejudice and creating a more equitable world—in Josephine Baker’s Last Dance.

In this illuminating biographical novel, Sherry Jones brings to life Josephine's early years in servitude and poverty in America, her rise to fame as a showgirl in her famous banana skirt, her activism against discrimination, and her many loves and losses. From 1920s Paris to 1960s Washington, to her final, triumphant performance, one of the most extraordinary lives of the twentieth century comes to stunning life on the page.

With intimate prose and comprehensive research, Sherry Jones brings this remarkable and compelling public figure into focus for the first time in a joyous celebration of a life lived in technicolor, a powerful woman who continues to inspire today.

Purchase Josephine Baker’s Last Dance in paperback,  ebook,  and  audiobook  formats on  Simon and Schuster’s website (available on Amazon,  Barnes and Noble,  BooksAMillion,  Indiebound,  Kobo,  and  other sites). Learn more about Sherry’s books  at  www.authorsherryjones.com



Thank you for this interview!  I’d like to know more about you as a person first.  What do you do when you’re not writing?

When I’m not writing, I’m reading the best fiction I can find, dancing to live music, enjoying the company of my many friends, cooking gourmet meals, or traveling. I also play classical piano and really love the opera.

When did you start writing?

I began writing at age 7, in the second grade. I had a wonderful teacher who said to me, before the entire class, “When you become an author, publish using your given name so I’ll know it’s you.” I’ve lost touch with her, but I hope she realizes what an impact she made on my life.

As a published author, what would you say was the most pivotal point of your writing life?

When my first novel, THE JEWEL OF MEDINA, attracted international controversy and death threats. I had to make a choice about where I stood and why I am a writer. Today, I understand that, just as when I worked aa a journalist for 30+ years before becoming a novelist, I write to make a positive difference in the world.

If you could go anywhere in the world to start writing your next book, where would that be and why?

I live in the perfect city to start that book. My next protagonist lived for 30 years in Spokane, Washington, where I live now.

If you had 4 hours of extra time today, what would you do?

Clean my house! But alas, it’s not going to happen today. I will ride my exercise bicycle and practice Spanish, make a pot of soup, and read the Sunday New York Times—without the extra hours.

Where would you like to set a story that you haven’t done yet?

In Spokane! I envision a roman a clef called HINTERLAND.

Back to your present book, JOSEPHINE BAKER’S LAST DANCE, how did you publish it?

Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon and Schuster, is my publisher, and I wrote this book under contract.

In writing your book, did you travel anywhere for research?

I traveled to Paris (twice), New York City, and St. Louis, MO, Josephine Baker’s childhood home, to research this book.

Why was writing JOSEPHINE BAKER’S LAST DANCE so important to you?

I hope this book adds to the conversation that we are currently having in America about race.

Josephine Baker, like the protagonists of all my novels, was a woman who found her inner power and used it to make a positive difference in the world. Raised in poverty and abuse, she became a star of the stage and screen at a young age before dedicating her life to fighting racism. She worked as a spy for the French Resistance during World War II, risking her life many times, and became an outspoken anti-segregationist in the United States during her tour of the country in 1951, before the civil rights movement even began. She succeeded in getting many whites-only theaters, nightclubs, hotels, restaurants, and other venues to integrate. I found her inspirational, and knew that others would, too.

Where do you get your best ideas and why do you think that is?

My ideas come from everywhere: books I’ve reading, newspaper and magazine articles, courses I’m listening to, movies I watch. My problem isn’t a dearth of ideas, but a surplus of them. The hard part is choosing!

Any final words?

All my books are about amazing women in history. A’isha from THE JEWEL OF MEDINA and THE SWORD OF MEDINA; the four sisters from Provence in FOUR SISTERS, ALL QUEENS; the French queen Blanche de Castille in WHITE HEART; Heloise d’Argenteuil, the 12th-century scholar and esteemed abbess in THE SHARP HOOK OF LOVE, and the 20th-century African-American performer Josephine Baker demonstrate with their lives that one woman can make a positive difference in the world. This is such an important message for our times—and writing these books is my way of trying to make a difference, too.

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Tuesday, March 12, 2019

Take a Peek Inside Love and the Mystery of Betrayal by Sandra Lee Dennis #books #bookexcerpt @sandraleedennis


Title: LOVE AND THE MYSTERY OF BETRAYAL
Author: Sandra Lee Dennis
Publisher: West County Press
Pages: 290
Genre: Relationships/Spiritual/Self-Help

BOOK BLURB:
Betrayal of love inflicts a unique, unprecedented pain you can only comprehend once you have experienced it. If you are suffering from an intimate betrayal, you know. Betrayal is stunning. It is mind-boggling. You feel paralyzed, mystified, enraged, panicked, bewildered; but, mostly, you hurt. Betrayal is a make-or-break event that marks a cataclysmic divide in your life. It changes you. When you believe in someone so completely and then realize they have been deceiving you about their love and loyalty, the worst thing happens: Your faith in yourself crumbles. The shock lifts a veil from your eyes, and you can never see yourself or the world in the same way again.

ORDER YOUR COPY:

Amazon


Book Excerpt:

In the messiness and ignorance of our humanity we struggle to cope with the demands of being human. We all make mistakes, especially in our closest relationships. Everyone can recall times of disappointment with friends, companions, family members, advisors, teachers, or coworkers when we have felt betrayed or betrayed others or ourselves. We gain self-knowledge and learn to apologize and to forgive as we work through the many ways we let each other down. There are minor, everyday betrayals, and then there are the life-exploding disclosures that I explore in this book, the ones that break your heart, fracture your world, and threaten to destroy your soul. I specifically address betrayal in love—a shattering of trust by the one you have been most
intimate with and relied on to protect you from harm.

If you are suffering from an intimate betrayal, you know. Betrayal is stun-ning. It is mind-boggling. It traumatizes you and upends your life. Mostly, it hurts. Betrayal inflicts a unique, unprecedented pain you can only compre-hend once you have experienced it. Interpersonal trauma changes you. It lifts a veil from your eyes, and you can never see the world in the same way again. Yet we live in a culture that is blind to both the depth of wounding and the heart-expanding potential of such a blow.

Before your trust was shattered, you lived shielded from the indescribable pain you feel now that the veil has lifted. Such havoc betrayal wreaks, the multilayered torments of body, mind, and soul are so extreme that it can feel like nothing less than torture. No wonder we tend to turn away, minimize, and bury the hurt. If you are like me, you also do not want anyone to know what is happening to you. It is humiliating and maddening to be in pain, obsessing about someone that has left, deceived, or cheated on you. You can begin to feel like a character in One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Friends and family tend to look the other way, too. No one likes to see a person so out of control of their destiny.




I know because I had the veil lifted from my eyes, in a familiar way known to many. The man I loved left me. With virtually no warning, my partner of six years walked out a few weeks before a big wedding we had planned. When he went from “I’ll love you forever” one day to “I’m finished with you” the next, it stopped my world. His wholly unanticipated exit from our home and my life led me to suffer more than I believed was humanly possible. At the same time, the distress awakened depths of my heart that took my capacity to love into uncharted territory.

Meanwhile, friends and family advised me to get over it and move on as quickly as possible. They were right, I reasoned, I would move on…I tried, but it was not to be. Once the initial shock lessened, I began to grasp that my trust in life had disappeared. My entire world had suddenly turned hostile, or so it seemed, because of the faithlessness of one person—albeit one very central person, the one I had counted most in the world to be there and care for me. His abrupt about-face marked a cataclysmic divide in my life.

Prior to the moment he walked out, I had considered myself a together, self-aware person. After he left, I was more like a delusional broken heap. I put on a self-assured face, but wandered around like a Swiss cheese, shot full of holes, bewildered, with a secret, stabbing pain in my heart. I vacil-lated between rage, panic, and bouts of grief. Often I could not stop crying. Falling apart was to be expected—“everybody has been there”—after a tough breakup. But the problem was, as time went on, my condition got worse, not better. Instead of a few weeks or months, it went on for years.

I could not comprehend why I had gone from competent professional to terrified, whimpering child, unable to do much of anything, let alone “move on.” It was only later that I realized this was no ordinary breakup. Eventually, I realized how deeply I had been traumatized, and that the nightmare of post-traumatic stress had set in.

Mine is not an obvious or sensational horror story of betrayal and abuse. I was not hit, or cheated on, raped or stolen from, yelled at, or bullied into submission, not even abandoned dramatically at the altar. I wrote this book to help show how relational trauma these days is often not obvious. Many of us have become too educated, smooth, or sophisticated for such overt aggres-sion. The damage to my trust and the erosion of the quality of my life came from mind-bending subtleties, primarily half-truths concealed as exceptional honesty: from bouts of seduction and warmth laced with withholding and withdrawal; insincere profusions of praise, affection and loyalty, interspersed with blame and criticism; important omissions of personal history; sexual manipulation masked as the deepest love; systematic devaluation; and finally a complete Jekyll-and-Hyde character reversal. Abandonment and replace-ment were only the final and most obvious blows to my sanity and stability.

Emotional abuse and mental cruelty can be more damaging than blatant physical abuse because, at least when someone beats you, or cheats on you, it is clearly their problem. When you have a dagger plunged into your heart while being held in a loving embrace, on the other hand, you do not know what hit you. When you are betrayed with charm and a smile, it is stunning and crazy making. If you have given the benefit of the doubt to and believed in your partner, it can take a long time to get the hook out and make sense of your world again. Meanwhile, you wonder if you are fit any longer for human company, or if you should have yourself committed for observation.

As I tried to make sense of what happened, my mind flooded with ques-tions. Perhaps the most painful was, “How could I not have seen this com-ing?” When you believe in someone so completely and then realize they have been deceiving you about their love and loyalty, the worst thing happens: Your faith in yourself crumbles. The instincts you relied on to perceive and under-stand your world have misled you, and you do not know how you will ever be able to trust yourself again. It alarmed me when I realized I had lost faith, not only in myself, but also in other people—and, most disturbingly, in life itself.

My heart goes out to you if you are in a similar situation. Perhaps what I share will help you sort through the bewilderment and confusion, regain trust in your own perceptions, and get through the worst. I had lived a lot of life and had a lot of psychological experience and inner resources when this ax fell. If anyone “should” have seen this coming and been prepared when it did, it was I. But I was not at all prepared.

To make it through this ordeal, I turned instinctively to my spiritual prac-tices: mindfulness meditation, inquiry, yoga. I coped by sitting for hours each day, breathing and watching the chaos, tracking sensations, thoughts, and feelings. I was astonished at how much I learned—more, I thought, in two years than I had in the ten previous. As a former college psychology professor, and a teacher at heart, passing on what I learn comes almost as second nature.

I did a lot of research in the effort to understand what I was going through. I read hundreds of books and talked to scores of people. I researched a wide range of subjects and touch on many here—trauma, posttraumatic stress, domestic violence, subtle-body experiences, attachment theory, projection and splitting, death and dying, faith and conscience, grief and forgiveness, Buddhist meditation and Christian contemplation and prayer. I found that prescriptions and advice abound on how to survive the loss of love, to heal from a broken heart, to endure a dark night of the soul, to put your life back




together, and to move on after being betrayed or abandoned. But for a long time, I found little that validated my extreme experiences.

Those around me, and even I, considered being abandoned by the person I intended to spend the rest of my life with an unfortunate, but minor event to be swept aside and forgotten, the sooner, the better. After all, people readily recover from far worse things. Conventional wisdom, I discovered, was way off with its clichéd treatment of heartbreak and betrayal as minor blips on the screen of life that you tend to for a while before moving on to better things.

The shame I felt about the depth and duration of the pain, along with the fact my friends, family, and even counselors did not understand, encour-aged my silence. The lingering effects on those of us who receive such a shock become a secret we do not want to share with anyone. We even want to hide the life-changing repercussions from ourselves. Amidst my struggle to recover, I recognized that many who had undergone similar experiences had simply shut down. For a time, I feared I would do the same. The continuing torment of having my heart torn out by someone I believed loved me deeply and to whom I had committed my love and life was just too much to bear.

When you hurt this much, instinctively you want to help make it less difficult for anyone else in pain. I never set out to write this book, but once it started pouring out of me, I felt how much I wanted to bring more light to the facts of what an experience like this actually does to a person. There was so much to learn about this underrated trauma—the “most difficult of all woundings,” as one author put it. I decided to base this book first on immer-sion into the lived experience, a type of phenomenological research. I believe this approach led to the emergence of a more nuanced perspective and a deeper understanding than a study based on analysis and theory alone could offer.

The orientation that guided me was to turn with curiosity toward the suf-fering, rather than stifling the pain or distracting myself. This approach will be familiar to many spiritual seekers and to those who have struggled to come to terms with great loss—the way out is through the darkness. What it takes to make this turn, to go from theory to practice in the midst of prolonged psychological pain, tells an unforeseen story for each of us.

Taken to heart this way, I found betrayal to be an initiation into an unknown self. The shock launches the betrayed on a “night sea journey,” that stage in spiritual growth known in mystical traditions as a dark night of the soul. In this mythological descent you are taken suddenly into deep waters and swallowed up by a sea dragon. Like Jonah, you are stripped bare and robbed of what is dearest to your heart. The metaphors of darkness and night apply because you do not know what is happening. You feel as if you must be dying



and you are. Some part of your old nature is being shorn away to make way for the new you cannot imagine, and over which you have no control.

Ultimately, we each have to find our own way in the dark, until we are thrown back onto land and the light of day. I share my truth, knowing no one can tell another what it takes to welcome this unwanted journey. It took me years to recover myself, and I fought it all the way, but I finally came to recog-nize that betrayal and trust form two poles of experience. Apparently, we can-not embrace one until we have drunk deeply of the other. Through destroying my trust, and taking me into more suffering than I had ever known, betrayal catalyzed a transformation inside that awakened qualities of faith, compas-sion, and love I barely imagined were possible.

During the long days and nights of blame and rage, of tears and star-ing off into space, beneath my awareness, strange mystic moments penetrated through the pain. These elusive flashes of truth, fleeting at first, but arrest-ing, planted seeds of renewed faith and trust in the ground of my own raw heart. With time, against all instinct, I learned to embrace the humiliation and heartbreak as the terrain I needed to pass through in order to deepen into secrets of a love my soul was hungry to taste.

Never before had I felt such intimate kinship with life around me. Never had my heart beaten in such rhythm with others in pain. Never had I sensed such a fervent need not to harm anyone else with my actions. Never had I felt the vast sadness I had carried in my bones my entire life. Never before had I sensed the touch of the “hands of light” comforting me, or the gentle power of the earth and sky supporting me, or the tender stirrings in my heart of what I could only call divine love flowing toward me.

All this took time, much more than I approved of. Meanwhile I thought the pain would never end. A turning point in my struggles came when I began to question the true source of my torments. One day, in one of those flashes, I intuited that the obvious villain—the person who had hurt me so griev-ously—had been but an instrument in the hands of an unseen destiny. I real-ized the peace I needed to make was not with my errant partner, but with my own heart, my fate, my God. The insight came and went, but the truth had touched my core.

While each story of love’s betrayal is unique, as are the individuals involved, betrayal is an archetypal experience. It is an event that we each carry in our collective memory, from the moment of being born into this world. Because of its archetypal core, the study of betrayal’s dynamics and impact has something to teach us all. If, however, you have been spared the trial of an intimate betrayal, what I describe may not make much sense to you. It may seem extreme, exaggerated, even melodramatic. That would have been



the case for me before I passed through this ordeal. I would not have had the slightest interest in a book such as this one. I had no idea.

For this reason, I offer this book primarily, and believe it will be most help-ful, for those who have been betrayed, now or in the past, by someone they loved and trusted; and for those wishing to help another navigate these waters. I offer my story and my perspective, along with the results of my research, not as an authority, but as a fellow traveler. I offer companionship, validation, and solace if you are going through this harrowing time. I admit right now that in the extended darkness, I despaired of ever trusting or caring enough to engage life again. While I hoped against hope that the proverbial “pearl of great price” was waiting to be found in the ruins of my torn-up heart, my doubts were grave. I chronicle many of those doubts here.

I can report that finally the miracle of saying yes to what I wanted least in my life did take root in my soul. To my surprise, the shattering of my world had magnetized a grace that was teaching me how and what to trust. As I write now, nearly five years later, recovering myself is a work in progress. But I have learned the greatest lesson in my life to date. Deep suffering invites us into mystery: The pain speaks a message we need and long to hear. The rage and yearning are prayers for truth, for love. At the point of utmost brokenness, I did indeed find a golden pearl—the longing cry of my own heart for a love that endures, a greater, divine love that cannot and does not die.

Please let my words resonate with your own experience where and how they will. I know I cannot speak for what anyone else is going through. But I trust that the universal core of this journey into and through the heart broken in love will ring true for many. I wish for you, too, to find your gold.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

SANDRA LEE DENNIS, PhD, is an author, teacher and explorer of the interplay of depth psychology and spirituality. She holds an MA in Psychology and a PhD in Integral Studies/ Psychology and Religion. She has been on the faculty of several universities, as well as the San Francisco Jung Institute.

Sandra’s writings bridge the world of scholar and visionary. She loves to bring light to those subtle interior spheres that defy description, and can appear frightening or unreal to the logical mind.  Her deep-diving explorations have helped many to “translate their darkness” — to name and bring compassion to their grief, anger, confusion and pain.

She was a teacher in the Gurdjieff tradition for many years, an Ananda Yoga instructor, and a long-time student of Diamond Heart work.  Currently, she is enjoying life in the Bay Area.

Website Address: www.sandraleedennis.com
Blog Address: http://www.sandraleedennis.com/healing-a-broken-heart-blog/
Twitter Address: https://twitter.com/Sandraleedennis
Facebook Address: https://www.facebook.com/SandraLeeDennisAuthor
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