This fine book is available now at our bookstore....

Eyes of Sophia: A Dream Come True

by Alan Chien and Donna May

218 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); includes 37 illustrations and 10 photographs; catalogue #00-0013; ISBN 1-55212-349-9; US$24.50, C$28.00, EUR20.00, £14.00

An adventure of heart and spirit, Eyes of Sophia entertains and inspires, offering a real-life demonstration of the magic of following the heart.

Read more!

about the book      about the authors      Foreword      catalogue info

About the Book Eyes of Sophia is a true love story which confirms the multi-dimensional nature of our existence. This story shows us that we really do co-create our lives in concert with a loving and organizing Divine Presence, Sophia, which speaks to us through our hearts. Too often we are easily intimidated by the authority and advice of the outer world and cease to trust these tender feelings which offer us continual and perfect guidance. The magical tapestry of events we experience when reading Eyes of Sophia is given credence by a series of extraordinary photographs and we are blessed with the revelation that, indeed, we can attain our hearts' desires. "This book is an extraordinary account by two extraordinary people. Given the premise that Sophia's world lies hidden and invisible within this one the continual synchronicities abounding in this true story make sense, if not serving as proof of its existence. Though the account is extremely personal it touches the universal and thus becomes meaningful to anyone reading it. It's Donna's loving and enthusiastic eye that reveals it and Alan's charming and rational acceptance that gives it form. I marvel that I had the privilege of playing a small part in this unusual drama!" -Alice O. Howell Author of The Web in the Sea and The Dove in the Stone "You and Donna have experienced, certainly at a feeling state, at least one other cognitive band of this total reality and you appear to have some space-time cognitive data in the form of your pictures to confirm that something extra-ordinary was happening." -William A. Tiller, PhD Author of Science and Human Transformation (written after viewing the photographs, September, 1995) "This is a truly spiritual book, in which the presence of divine love allows the experience of human love to flourish. It can be read as a romantic story like Bridges of Madison County, but here the romance is allowed to flourish and lead to a sustained relationship, and there is an experience of divine grace as well as human passion." -Harvey Honig Jungian Analyst "Exceptionally written by two brilliant souls, one who--although already knowing she was on her perfect path--still continued to question the symbols along the way; while the other's eyes were slowly beginning to focus on truth and authenticity instead of the superfluous. Each overlooked the external to follow the twisting, winding path that was filled with intent and purpose. It is a rarity to find individuals so willing to lovingly examine and absorb the many messages the rest of us ignore as we go about our lives on 'auto pilot.' A wonderful, refreshing true love story that affirms the closer we get to our own authentic selves, the more blissful our joy--joy that flourishes in the knowledge that there are no accidents and that cause never was the reason." -Kimberly Largent Managing Editor The Health Strategist Eyes of Sophia is a love story...a grand and wondrous love story about the authors, and their relationship with Sophia, the Spirit in their hearts. Further, Donna May and Alan Chien have given us a story about synchronicity and destiny...and the ability to listen to, and the courage to follow our hearts. Abundant synchronicities (events that on the level of cause and effect are amazing coincidences) brought Donna May and Alan together, and together, and together...each time deepening their relationship. Included in the synchronicities are a series of intriguing photographs which give credence to the story. Eyes of Sophia is a transformational story that teaches the creative use of metaphor in understanding the relevance and significance of coincidences. Creatively woven together in the events in this story are spiritual metaphors of the Wizard of Oz, the Tree of Life, Kabbala and the dynamics of the life-force and chakras, including the splenic chakra. One important lesson Eyes of Sophia teaches us is that we must listen to our own hearts...and not yield to the rules that others inflict upon us; we must be true to ourselves. We must stay attuned to our heart and listen to what it is telling us and keep our thoughts and the images in our mind centered in that. Further, we all have tremendous creative imagination working for us at all times: It's so important to understand that we use the same power of imagination every moment and it will create in accordance with our intenet and beliefs! We can't afford not to pay attention to the quality of our beliefs, motives, and what we look for and how we picture it! Eyes of Sophia tells a magical, miraculous and marvelous story of finding love and Spirit. Donna May and Alan Chien are blessed...and teach us that we too, can achieve what is in our hearts...a dream come true! Richard Fuller Senior Editor Metaphysical Reviews Read the news release for this title.

---

About the Authors Alan Chien was born in Shanghai, China in 1930 and moved to New York State shortly after the Japanese invasion in 1937. There he spent most of his life until his recent move to the Midwest. He graduated from Wesleyan University with BA and MAT degrees, served in the army and taught art at public schools for 30 years. He now enjoys putting his energy into his art work. Donna May was born in 1952 and grew up in Southern Wisconsin. Donna has been a metaphysician in private practice for over 15 years. She continues to facilitate healing in others through utilizing her unique understanding and highly developed skills in bio-energetic healing and spiritual astrology. It was Alan's background in art and photography which attracted the attention of Donna May, who was preparing to write a book. They became partners in this venture and in life. They are married and live in Southern Wisconsin where their home is filled with love--Alan's art and photography, aromas of their latest joint cuisine efforts, continuous music, their dog and three cats. Contact Donna and Alan at 608-752-9934 or email donna.s.may@gmail.com

---

Preface

In September of 1994 I took a photograph of Donna May and in the picture there appeared several extra eyes on her forehead. What led up to that event and what transpired afterwards is pure magic. We have come to know that the world is enchanted and that enchantment is what people seek to give meaning to their lives. This story was a gift to us which we now pass on to you.

-Alan Chien

Foreword

This is a book that has drawn me in. I am on the fringes of the story, a minor character, and heard the outlines of the story the first time I met Donna and Alan. As many people would be, I was skeptical and cautious about the meaning and validity of this story. However, as I came to know Alan and Donna a bit more, I experienced them as people of intelligence and integrity, and the story began to draw me in more. However, I still remained somewhat distant until Donna and Alan sent me a copy of the completed manuscript. In reading this manuscript, I was drawn all the way in, as I think many people will be, and it has stimulated much thought and interest on my part.

There are different layers to this story which I find engaging. One level, perhaps the one that intrigues initially, is the level of the many synchronicities that drew Donna and Alan together and that draw this story together. Synchronicities are events that on the level of cause and effect are amazing coincidences, but for people who experience them and pay attention to them they are signs which point to events of great significance for our lives. These coincidences pull us into a different world than our normal reality, a world which people like Carlos Castaneda and James Redfield have talked about, in which our eyes are opened to see a different level of reality. However, in this story, the world we enter is not an exotic world of different cultures and strange events, but the ordinary world that all of us inhabit as experienced through a wider reality than we normally allow ourselves.

However, amazing coincidences can only sustain our interests if there is something of depth into which we are drawn. In Eyes of Sophia, this depth is provided by a profound love story, a story of two people who were truly drawn together, but were able to experience this profound union only because they were open to allowing the truth of this reality to break through their normal defenses. Because of their openness, love is able to break through fear and constriction. At another level, this is a story of following truth as well as love, of following truth until it leads to a dimension where we enter a different reality, in which we recognize the presence of the Tao, or the Kingdom of God, or the Divine Matrix. In that sense, this is a truly spiritual book, in which the presence of divine love allows the experience of human love to flourish. It can be read as a romantic story like Bridges of Madison County, but here the romance is allowed to flourish and lead to a sustained relationship, and there is an experience of divine grace as well as human passion.

This book can also be read as a contemporary reenactment of the myth of Psyche and Eros. In this version both Psyche and Eros, or Donna and Alan, have their journeys to complete and tasks to fulfill to achieve union. For both of them the outer journey of love is mirrored by an inner marriage, in which Alan finds his heart and opens up to love and inner reality, and Donna works to integrate incredible intuitive and feeling events into a matrix of meaning and understanding.

In this sense, their story is a larger story than that of two people. It can also be read as the return of the repressed, the return of that intuitive knowing and deep loving, which is so absent in the rational, materially focused culture. However, it is not a return to a prerational world view, but an integration of eros and logos, of meaning and being.

In Julian Jaynes' book, The Origins of Consciousness and the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, the great linguistic scholar speculated that there was a time in which we were all once living in a matrix of collective unconsciousness, in which we all heard the voices of the gods. This consciousness is still found to some extent in aboriginal cultures, which seem to be in touch with a larger and more collective mind source.

In order to develop our individuality and rationality, we evolved through a period of development of the left brain, the rational intellect. We were cut off from the realm of the gods, but we were able to develop individual consciousness and world mastery, which led to modern democracy and technology. However, as in individual development, that which has been repressed culturally eventually needs to return and become part of the wholeness of being. There are many signs now that the intuitive/feeling/experiential knowledge that is often experienced as coming from within or above, of being connected with larger realities than our individual egos or everyday consciousness, is returning in our culture. However, it is returning, as in this story, in a new integration of intellect and intuition, of masculine and feminine, of scientific understanding and spiritual awareness. All this is embodied in the story of Alan and Donna, and it touches us because it becomes a mirror of and opening to our own journeys and struggles. Most of us do not experience it in this unique way, but we all have the possibility of entering this dimension of reality, and experiencing our own truth and inner journey. We are all touched by this current story of the coming together of Psyche and Eros; Donna and Alan have worked hard to integrate this story into their own world of meaning, and have told it very well. Alan's drawings and pictures help a great deal to bring this inner reality into concrete form. Eyes of Sophia performs an important service for us, and brings ahealing dimension to our culture.

-Harvey Honig
Jungian Analyst

---

Catalogue Information

---

About Trafford Publishing:
Our books are manufactured one-at-a-time to fill individual orders -- part of an innovative process we invented, called "on-demand publishing." Authors and organizations from 120 countries are using Trafford for their publishing needs.
If you (or your company) wish to list a title for sale to the public, contact the nearest office or select "publishing offices" from our bookstore pages for details.

Canada • USA • UK • Republic of Ireland Contact Us URL http://www.trafford.com © 1995-2005 Trafford Publishing, a division of Trafford Holdings Ltd. Trafford's Privacy Policy: Client information will never be provided to anyone outside of Trafford and its subsidiaries except where required by law.