The Hunger for Ecstasy: Fulfilling the Soul's Need for Passion and Intimacy

by Jalaja Bonheim

Overview

"In a world that is starving for ecstasy, this book offers powerful healing medicine. A passionate and wise invitation to open our lives and our souls to ecstasy, recognizing it for what it really is — the experience of our own divinity." – Deepak Chopra, author of How to Know God

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Do you believe ecstasy is a rarefied state enjoyed only now and then by exceptional people? Do you yearn for more intimacy and passion in your life? In this book, Jalaja Bonheim makes clear that ecstasy (both physical and spiritual) is neither a luxury nor an aberration. It is your birthright, an essential form of nourishment that the soul requires for its well-being.

Join Jalaja on a journey with poets, mystics, lovers, and monks to learn how to infuse passion into all aspects of your life. Drawing from many religious and cultural traditions and with anecdotes from the lives of the thousands whom Jalaja has counseled, she provides inspiring ways to feed your spiritual hunger through greater intimacy with yourself, others, and Spirit. With illuminating chapters on sexuality and marriage, Jalaja brings all aspects of life into the ecstasy equation.

Jalaja also discusses fear, self-consciousness, and the other common emotions that pose roadblocks to our fulfillment, along with the repercussions we face when we starve ourselves of soul nourishment.

The Hunger for Ecstasy is about cultivating the joy and passion that will pull your spiritual life together.

Originally published in 2001 with Rodale Books.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940033292714
Publisher:	Jalaja Bonheim
Publication date:	06/14/2012
Sold by:	Smashwords
Format:	eBook
File size:	288 KB

About the Author

Jalaja is internationally known for her groundbreaking use of circle gatherings as a tool for empowering women, healing individuals and communities, and cultivating peace. For over 25 years, she has been leading circles, studying the dynamics of the circle, and developing a community of Circlework practitioners.

She is the founder and visionary director of the Institute for Circlework (www.instituteforcirclework.org), which serves as a hub to the growing community of Circlework practitioners around the world.

After spending her childhood in Austria and Germany, Jalaja studied classical temple dance in India before coming to the United States in 1982. She is the author of four books, which were inspired by her passion for integrating sexuality and spirituality, empowering women, and celebrating the feminine spirit.

Aphrodite's Daughters: Women's Sexual Stories and the Journey of the Soul is based on the stories of ordinary American women and explores the central role of sexuality in women's spiritual journey. Witty, wise, entertaining and compassionate, Aphrodite's Daughters quickly became an underground classic, and has changed the lives of thousands of women.

Jalaja's second great passion is peace. Growing up as a Jew in post-war Germany, the devastating impact of war led her on a life-long inquiry into the causes of human violence and the journey of healing and transformation.

Completely intimate with the spirit of the circle, she descrobes it as an archangel, and as an ally, guide, teacher and friend. She decodes its language for all of us, translates its messages of wholeness and homecoming, and explains its teachings. What she calls the spirit of the circle, others experience as a field of tremendous love and compassion, growth and learning, renewal and healing.

Jalaja has trained hundreds of Circlework leaders in America, Canada, and the Middle East, including ministers, teachers, social workers, psychotherapists, and corporate executives. She also serves as a consultant to groups and group leaders who want to create greater connection and intimacy between people, or need help in working through conflicts or other challenges. Since 2005, she has travelled regularly to Israel and Palestine, where she empowers Jewish and Palestinian women to serve as agents of peace and healing in their communities.