The Bay Area is rich with diverse cultures and ways of life. As a child one is influenced by certain leaders who capture the attention of the rest. Megan Wagner was one of those leaders growing up in the Bay Area. A Stanford and Fuller Theological Seminary graduate who married the local minister's son, she and her husband, Jim Larkin, went to London for many years where they became introduced to the world of Kabbalah. Today, both are spiritual leaders in the ancient traditions of Kabbalah and mysticism. They are healers who have developed specific exercises to tap into emotional wounding, meditations to increase self-awareness, creative art projects and rituals for personal and spiritual transformation, and tools to repair, rebalance and align body, psyche and spirit. Both are on the Board of Directors of The International Kabbalah Society. Both are ordained ministers. She is also a teacher of depth psychology, western mythology and Jewish and Christian stories. She is an artist who weaves her stories into the fabric of her robes. The combination of this training and experience has led Wagner to write a book called The Sapphire Staff: Walking the Western Mystical Way.

In this pioneering book, Megan guides you through 7 stages of healing, so that you can let go of limiting beliefs. She presents was is called the Tree of Life path of healing, with creative exercises and psycho-spiritual practices designed to heal the Western mind and heart.

In this book, as in her school, Tree of Life Training, she strives to guide people to greater health and wholeness, using a dynamic blend of Western therapy and the creative arts of drumming, chanting, storytelling, art, ceremony, dreamwork, guided meditation, body postures, prayers, affirmations and ritual.

Megan Wagner & Jim Larkin

Upcoming Book Signings & Robe Performances with Megan Wagner, Jim Larkin and Noelle Morris

Sat. June 12th, 8 pm, St. Mark's Church, Palo Alto

Fri. July 30th, 7:30 pm, Grace North Church, Berkeley

St. Mark's Episcopal Church, 600 Colorado Ave., Palo Alto, California (midtown Palo Alto, off Middlefield) $10 at the door.

Grace North Church, 2138 Cedar Street, Berkeley, California. $10 at the door

To order Megan's book ($21.95 plus tax), please call: (650) 364.5171

For further information, go to: TreeofLifeTeachings.com

Inspire & Be Inspired!

~Jennifer King

New York Times:

Lynne Truss was on her way to deliver a lecture at the British Library recently when she was reminded yet again that a tremendous gap exists between her natural obsessions and those of other people.

"Punctuation," Ms. Truss replied, when her taxi driver asked what she planned to talk about. But the word didn't compute; he heard something less weird in his head. "Ooh, in that case," he replied, "I better get you there on time!"

So it has been a shock to the rarefied system of Ms. Truss, 48, that her book "Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation," has become this year's surprise No. 1 best seller [in the United Kingdon]. Among the legions of the surprised are the executives at her publishing house, Profile Books, who ordered a modest initial printing of 15,000 books, but now have 510,000 in print; and Ms. Truss's friends and family.

"When I was writing it, everybody thought it was commercial suicide to spend any time at all -- even just four or five months -- on it because obviously it wouldn't sell," Ms. Truss said in an interview.

...

As for its title, it comes from a joke that begins, "A panda walks into a cafe."

The panda orders a sandwich, eats it and then fires a gun into the air. On his way out, he tosses a badly punctuated wildlife manual at the confused bartender and directs him to the entry marked "Panda."

Whereupon the bartender reads: "Panda. Large black-and-white bearlike mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves."

"Eats, Shoots & Leaves" will be released on April 12 in the United States. I checked Amazon.com and it is the number one best-selling book. Perhaps there is some hope for our country ...

-Tim