Your Truest Self - Free Downloadable Reader's Guide

Today's forecast for St. Peters, MO: Partly sunny, high 80 degrees. It's a fine day for finishing the deck, which Walt is busy doing right now. In fact, it's about this color.

If you're a regular visitor to Donna's Book Pub, you might remember Janice Lynne Lundy's guest blog awhile back. Jan recently e-mailed me that her book, Your Truest Self: Embracing the Woman You are Meant to Be, now has a free downloadable Reader's Guide, which she believes would be perfect for book discussion groups. For now, the guide is housed at her publisher's website, Ave Maria Press but will be available on Jan's website at a later date. Click on the Ave Maria Press link above for more information.

The reader's guide has questions for discussion, and Jan has created a unique group activity for each of the 12 Transformational Truths in Jan's book.

Guest Blogger - Janice Lynne Lundy

(Photo courtesy of Janice Lynne Lundy)

Today's forecast for St. Peters: Mostly cloudy, high 71, chance of thunderstorms this evening.

I'm pleased to have Janice Lynne Lundy LIVE as my guest blogger today. She is an inspirational speaker, interfaith spiritual director, syndicated magazine columnist, and the author of four self-help/spiritual growth books for women. Her newest book, Your Truest Self: Embracing the Woman You Are Meant to Be, has just been released by Sorin Books.

Jan is the author of three previously published personal and spiritual growth books: Coming Home to Ourselves: A Woman’s Journey to Wholeness; Awakening the Spirit Within; and Perfect Love: How to Find Yours and Make It Last Forever (co-authored with her husband, Brad Lundy). The mother of three, stepmother of four, and grandmother of three more, Jan resides on the peaceful shoreline of Grand Traverse Bay in northern Michigan with her husband, Brad, her creative partner and soul’s companion.

Today at Donna's Book Pub, Jan shares with us her thoughts on Living with a Wide-Open Heart. She is also available for questions or comments.

If you have any questions or comments for Jan, please leave a note here and she will answer it.

Living with a Wide-Open Heart
Janice Lynne Lundy

How do we keep our heart open to someone, especially when everything inside of us says to run, shut down, or close ourselves off to them? How do we stay—remaining openhearted, loving, and kind?

Living this Transformational Truth, “I Open My Heart to Others and Celebrate Our Oneness,” can be difficult. So much so, that I placed it at as the twelfth and final truth in Your Truest Self. It is also the most important Truth if we are to live as the glorious women we are meant to be.

Living an in openhearted manner depends upon spaciousness—our ability to be open—open to yourself, to life as it presents itself in the moment, and to those around you. Spaciousness is about living with a wide-open heart, welcoming and loving yourself as you are, even when you make mistakes. Welcoming and loving others as they are, warts and all. Spaciousness is the placeholder for love.

Our journey to be more loving toward others begins with being more loving toward ourselves. Other-love must begin with self-love. How is it possible to demonstrate kindness, compassion, to another when we continue to be unkind to ourselves? It’s not.

There are many ways that we are unkind to ourselves every single day. We push ourselves beyond all reasonable limits. We have very high expectations, often holding ourselves to impossible standards of perfection. We overwork and do not get enough rest. We believe we must meet everyone else’s needs first before tending to our own. We feel responsible for the happiness of others. Do these scenarios play out in your life?

If so, it may be time to befriend yourself.

Befriending requires an attitude of lovingkindness toward one’s self, personified by acts of lovingkindness. We begin to live more gently, letting go of pressure to do and be more. Lovingkindness invites us let go of anything that causes stress, frustration, or anger. Anything that keeps us disconnected from our spirit and its core qualities of inner peace, love, and joy. Anything that prevents us from living as our truest self—a woman who is naturally peaceful and compassionate.

And as we do, our heart flutters open. It softens, becomes more pliable. We start to feel better about who we, about our life. Magically, we begin to see those around us in a new way, too—through the eyes of compassion. We become aware that they are struggling, as are we. With a slight shift in perception, we can see how all of us are struggling to cope with life as it is.

We begin to open our hearts to one another through greater awareness of this universal struggle to be human. Voila! Compassion is born. Spaciousness reigns, and there is room in our hearts for everyone.

In this similar cause, we are kindred spirits. We are One.

©2009, Janice Lynne Lundy

You can also learn more about Jan at her website: http://www.awakenedliving.com/ While you're there, register for her newsletter and she'll send you her new, inspirational 90-page e-book, The Awakened Woman's Guide to Life. You can also visit her blog: http://www.awakeisgood.blogspot.com/ She enjoys hearing from her readers and responds personally. Email: jan@awakenedliving.com.

Book Notes - Your Truest Self by Janice Lynne Lundy

(Your Truest Self cover image, courtesy of Janice Lynne Lundy)

Today's forecast for St. Peters: Showers likely, high 65 degrees, but I'll take the rain over sleet or snow any day.

I'm honored and excited that Donna's Book Pub has been selected to be part of WOW!'s Guest Blogger tour. If you're wondering what a blog tour is, it's like a book tour, but instead of authors visiting book stores, they stop by blogs to chat with blog visitors.

Tomorrow I will host my first guest blogger, interfaith spiritual guide and author, Janice Lynne Lundy, who will talk about "Living with a Wide Open Heart." Lundy writes a nationally syndicated magazine column in Women's LifeStyle magazine and is an adjunct staff member at the Institute of Spirituality at the Dominican Center at Marywood in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

In preparation for tomorrow's visit, I will share some observations about Lundy's latest book, Your Truest Self: Embracing the Woman You Are Meant to Be, released by Sorin Books, of Ave Maria Press.

From an early age, Lundy has been fascinated with "holy women," beginning in her childhood when she lived down the street from a Dominican convent, into her college days as an anthropology student, and into recent years when her imagination has been captured by mystics, saints, and other holy women.

The Introduction to Your Truest Self begins with a quote from St. Francis of Assisi, "You are that which you are seeking." This quote sets the stage for our journey.

Lundy's book is laid out as a guide for readers seeking a path of self-discovery to help them live Spirit-filled lives. The book is divided in twelve chapters called "Transformational Truths"--one from each of her spiritual mentors whose "light-filled presence" can help guide women "to live more peaceful, confident, and open-hearted lives."

Among the mentors are: Joyce Rupp, author and retreat leader and member of the Servants of Mary; Jan Phillips, a photographer, writer and modern-day mystic; Naomi Judd, country music singer, author and talk show host; Dr. Doreen Virtue, author and workshop facilitator, called "The Angel Lady;" Michelle Tsosie Sisneros, award-winning Native American artist and illustrator, and other wise women from a variety of backgrounds.

I found Lundy's book engaging, enriching, and thought-provoking. In addition to reading the words of wisdom from the twelve spiritual mentors, I enjoyed the Reflection Questions and Peaceful Pause sections at the end of each chapter, which gave me the opportunity to think about and absorb what I had read.
The poem in the Epilogue written by American poet Galway Kinnell is a lovely way to end the book, and an inspiring way to continue the journey of opening my heart to others.

Please stop by tomorrow to read Lundy's article, "Living with a Wide Open Heart," written specially for visitors of my blog. Also please feel free to leave questions tomorrow on the blog for Jan to answer.