The Soul-Directed Life

The month of May is devoted to "the call to pray" and who better to kick off the month than my first teacher, Agni Jaya Charlotte Starfire. Join me on Charlotte's virtual living room floor as she shares what she has learned from a deep exploration of three ancient prayer traditions: Native American, Goddess, and Yogic. Turn to the East, South, West, and North as she leads us in a prayer of the six directions. Learn how Charlotte's name changed three times to express more and more divine fire. This is the perfect conversation to begin our month of prayer.

Everyone wants to know their soul purpose. We all long to live an authentic life, and a life that brings us a sense of fulfillment and purpose. At the end of every month, we read and share a book that captures the essence of the month's theme. And for this month, on the "call to purpose," the perfect book is Callings by Gregg Levoy. Ellen Debenport, minister of Unity of Wimberley, Texas, is a great student of this book. She believes in Callings so strongly, she created workshops around it. Join in for this rich conversation on how to hear and heed the call from the soul to live an authentic life.

Maggie Oman Shannon is the spiritual director of Unity Spiritual Center of San Francisco. Maggie has heard and responded to the call to purpose not once, not twice, but three unique times, first as an author, then as a minister, and finally as a late-in-life mother. Along the way she has written many of your favorite books on prayer, including The Way We Pray and Prayers for Hope and Comfort. Her newest book,

Did you know that your soul imprinted your purpose and other core information on your hands at 14 weeks in the womb? Gail McMeekin is a creativity coach, author of The 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women and 12 Secrets of Highly Successful Women, and a deep student of scientific hand analysis, a soul interpretation method that can help you come face to face with your unique purpose and life challenges. Gail has conducted hundreds of hand analyses for artists, lawyers, young adults, writers, speakers, and others seeking to understand what they're here to do and how to fulfill that purpose.

We kick off our conversation of the "call to purpose" with Lauralyn Bunn, a master teacher and trainer of the Akashic Record. Lauralyn Bunn shares what a soul purpose is and is not, how our individual soul purposes are similar and how they're different and unique, and what she's learned after 20 years of Akashic Record consultations. Be sure to listen and post your comment by Monday April 8 to win an Akashic Record consultation. This is Lauralyn's first radio appearance. Don't miss it.

When you feel the call from your soul to leave home, what do you do? Call a travel agent? Start packing? The best way is to begin at the beginning with The Art of Pilgrimage by Phil Cousineau, a classic guide on how to make travel sacred. The Art of Pilgrimage is celebrating its 15th year in print with a new edition from Conari Press. Phil is an author, screenwriter, photographer, editor, documentary filmmaker, and, of course, world traveler. His love of sacred travel shines through on his TV series Global Spirit. Phil will be with us to lead the discussion. You do not want to miss this! It will change the way you travel forever.

Kim Narenkivicius answered "the call to leave home" in a big way. The call began in a dream. An old woman in a small village in France held out a scallop shell. Then Kim stumbled upon real scallop shells in an antique store. She got the message! The Camino de Santiago is the most famous pilgrimage route in history. From the time St James's remains were carried by boat from Jerusalem to Northern Spain and buried in the city of Santiago de Compostela, millions have put a scallop shell around their neck and walked this arduous trail. Most modern pilgrims walk only a small portion. Kim walked the entire route slowly and soulfully, stopping to take photographs and write. She blogs about the experience at http://soulfulroad.wordpress.com. This is the first time Kim has told her story on air. Do not miss it!

I have a special and deeply personal gift for you: Gayle Lawrence, founder of Journeys of Discovery http://www.ajourneyofdiscovery.com. Three years ago Gayle told me something magical always happens when you step away from your known, scheduled life and travel into the unknown. I didn't understand what she was talking about until I took my first group of soul writers on a Gayle-designed Soul-Journ to Oaxaca, Mexico. The experience was so profound, I now lead a Soul-Journ every year. Listen as Gayle tells us what it's like to swim with a humpback mother whale and her calf, track gorillas in Uganda, and enter sacred sites tourists never get to see. It all started when the rocks in Machu Picchu spoke to her. Come listen to what happens when you step into an outer adventure that becomes an inner journey for your soul.

Our theme for March is "the call to leave home" and we kick it off with a man who heard the call at 23 and followed it all the way to India where he discovered the paradoxical truth: The call to leave home is the call to come home! Listen as John Welshons tells the story of how India changed him forever, how Ram Dass gave him the name "Ramananda" in a dream, and how he became a meditation practitioner and teacher. His book, One Soul, One Love, One Heart is a treasure trove of wisdom on the transcendental truth that we are all one. An added bonus: John shares the four characteristics of a mystical experience. What a way to begin our month!

There are many wonderful books on creativity. But there's only one by Matthew Fox, the man who changed the spiritual landscape with Creation Spirituality and Original Blessing. Our book club selection for February is Creativity: Where the Divine and the Human Meet. This sweet book is a meditation on creativity, not as a means toward producing anything, but as our true nature. We were created to create. So this call, bubbling up from the soul that we've been feeling all month, is a call to be who we really are. Matthew Fox will be with us to lead the discussion. You do not want to miss this!

This month we are exploring the call to create. We've spoken with a writer/artist and a photographer/creativity guide. Today we bypass particular creative expressions and go deep into the heart of the creative impulse itself. Where does creativity come from? Why, the soul, of course. It comes from Your Creative Soul, and the woman who wrote the book, C Diane Ealy, will be with us to talk about the inherent nature of the soul to create. You'll learn why laughter is divine, how to become a vessel for your creative soul, why "misfitness" is a very good thing, and why creativity isn't for wimps!

It's Valentine's Day. The day of love. So The Soul-Directed Life is going to revel in love-the love of the creative life. You know Catherine Anderson as the author of the award-winning The Creative Photographer. But in this conversation, you may be surprised to learn that Catherine was a successful attorney in South Africa. But her soul kept calling her to live a life of creativity and beauty. All the success in the world couldn't silence that call. Catherine left South Africa and the legal profession, and she slowly forged a life of creativity and joy in Charlotte, North Carolina. You'll love her story. Plus, in honor of Valentine's Day, Janet will play Daniel Nahmod's top love song and give away a few "love" gifts on the show.

Our theme for February is "The Call to Create." We kick it off in the company of a woman who has created a unique, expressive style that combines art and words-Mary Anne Radmacher. Walk into any classy bookstore and you'll find an array of her posters, greeting cards, and books. Her most recent book, Honey in Your Heart, joins such classics as Lean Forward Into Your Life and Live With Intention. Mary Anne is a guest expert on the creative life in Janet's summer creativity course, Plug In for Expressive Souls, where she has been heard to say, "My work is my play and my play is my work, and all of it is prayer." Come, start our month of creativity, hearing how one woman heard the call to create and never looked back. View Mary Anne's posters, cards, calendars, and books at https://deannardavis.infusionsoft.com/app/storeFront/showCategoryPage?categoryId=64.

Our month of exploring how the soul answers the call to go inside culminates with a live discussion of the first The Soul-Directed Life Book Club selection. Hundreds of great books have helped us go inside, but one more than any other has opened our eyes to what can happen when we turn out eyes away from the world and go inside. Originally published in 1946, Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramhansa Yogananda, has changed hundreds of thousands of people's lives. The perfect person to help us understand the full impact of this seminal book is Philip Goldberg, author of American Veda, a top-10 spiritual book for 2011. This book belongs in your soul's library and this discussion belongs in your heart.

There are many ways to answer the call of the soul to go inside. One of them is to create a spiritual practice of stopping once a day, taking a breath, and creating a space in your heart open and ready to receive the wisdom of a few holy words. A million people around the world open Daily Word® every morning for that little moment of turning inside. Laura Harvey is the editor of the Daily Word. Join Janet and Lauren as they talk about the spiritual practices of reading and writing and how you, too, can use words to hear the true voice of your soul.