There are books I’ve read which I’ll never remember and books that have made such an impact on my life I’ll never forget them. Like Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl which leapt off a bookstore shelf and landed at my feet or Nathaniel Hill’s Think and Grow Rich, which is always a catalyst for innovative ideas or Claude Bristol’s The Magic of Believing wherein he explains that belief itself has amazing power.

There is also The Intuitive Way by Penney Pierce. I have yet to finish this book and don’t know that I ever will, but for me, it was a life saver, a life preserver as I was being thrown about by raging seas; something I grasped onto for dear life, during a period when my loved ones were losing theirs.

Mom passed over on March 8, 2018. I look like her and I’m sure in some ways act like her, but our relationship didn’t always run smoothly. She said that I ‘challenged’ her, and I said someone needed to. Often at family gatherings we still reminisce about what a character she was and how her nickname, No Filter Nancy, suited her because if something was on the top of her mind, it was on the tip of her tongue, with no filter in between.  As she aged, her mindset became more negative while mine was pretty positive… we clashed. For a number of reasons, I was her primary care giving child at that point in our lives. She was a strong spirit, and her passing left a painful hole in my life.

My sister Shannon, my best friend, the woman in my life who understood me better than any other, had fought health issues for several years. Her condition worsened shortly after Mom passed and I spent several months driving to hospitals across state, and down state and to her home up north to be with her. In October, seven months after Mom passed, Shan was also gone. It was a relief that her painful journey was over, but her loss was devastating for me. There are still times I miss her so much, but she will come to me as energy, give me a quick hug and zoom away again.

In the Spring of 2019, my husband Rocky’s younger brother lost his life in a motorcycle accident, which was just prior to Rocky’s diagnosis of stage 4 prostate cancer.  He fought a hard battle for nearly two exhaustive years. It was a draining, emotional rollercoaster ride that went from joy and love spiraling down to powerlessness, desperation, grief, and every emotion in between. It was during this time that I found The Intuitive Way.

In January 2021, about 2 months before my Rocky’s passing, I was seeking relief from the crushing stress in my life and made appointments for myself and my daughter with a healing therapist for a cranial sacral massage session. While my daughter was in the first session, I looked around the shop where the massage center was located and eventually landed in the book section, where new and used, spiritual and metaphysical books were for sale. 

The Intuitive Way caught my eye, and I flipped it open to the forward pages written by Carol Adrienne and read the following passage… “Eventually, if we are lucky, life gets painful enough that we are forced to turn away from what we know and turn toward what we don’t know. Our journey intensifies when we begin to engage with the unknown and take the road less traveled.” Lucky? Really? Lucky that life gets painful enough?!? I sure as hell don’t feel fuckin’ lucky about how painful the last couple of years of my life have been!  It riled me up, but kind of intrigued me at the same time, though I couldn’t admit that until later. I shoved the book back on the shelf.

Thank goodness my session, meant to balance my nervous system, release tension and reduce stress, was wonderful.  The therapist Jamie was a very pleasant and interesting person and we had much in common.

Later, while standing at the cash register paying for a few items I said to the gentleman cashier ‘Wait a minute, let me go get that book.’ The cost of the book wasn’t clear and the cashier, who was the store owner as it turns out, decided to charge me half of the cover price which gave me additional assurance that I should buy the book. Who doesn’t like a deal?

During February of 2021, I worked from home as an independent contractor, doing marketing for assisted living homes and apartment complexes. I reduced my working hours to part-time so we could still survive financially, and I could be with Rocky.  He was getting weaker and spent more time resting and I spent more time reading as a distraction.

As I started reading The Intuitive Way, I realized that the books forward touched on many of the subjects and ideas I had discussed with the massage therapist. The books’ information resonated with me, and I could relate to the examples describing other people and their experiences. Once I hit upon an example of a woman whose name was also Colleen. By now, I was sure that finding this book was synchronicity. It was put in my path for a reason, and I committed myself to engaging with the book fully instead of my usual devour-the-book-fast-skip-the-exercises method.

The Intuitive Way was there for me when I needed it. When I had to escape reality and believe in something positive and know that life would be okay again in the future. I came to learn that I was lucky that my life got painful enough to turn away from what I knew and turn toward what I didn’t know. My journey intensified when I began to engage with the unknown and take the road less traveled.”