Jim Dreaver

Each of us has a personal story; a narrative that we tell ourselves about who we are. But too often those stories limit our possibilities and achievements. In End Your Story, Begin Your Life , Jim Dreaver offers a profound we can overcome obstacles, develop our creative power, and discover our true nature by letting go of the personal stories that define us. Dreaver lays out a straightforward practice that will help reader learn to see and experience life in the present moment, free of any negative thoughts, concepts, beliefs, or stories. He walks readers through his simple, easy-to-use three-step practice for be present with your experience; notice your story; see the truth. Dreaver shares his own spiritual journey to seek enlightenment and inner freedom, and reveals how he discovered this effective practice. He interweaves stories about people he has worked with using this process, both privately and in workshops, and the successful transformations they have made to happier more fulfilling lives.

An inspiring celebration of balance shows the middle path between spiritual satisfaction and material success, offering specific tools, tips, and techniques for achieving a state of equilibrium in a materialistic world. Original.

Here is an inspiring account of the healing journey and the steps needed to achieve a high level of wellness in body, mind, and spirit. The goal -- the "ultimate cure" -- of the healing journey is to discover the happiness that comes from within, that doesn't depend on circumstances. This delightfully honest and wise book will give you the expert guidance you need to make that happiness real. Based on the transformational workshops of Dr. Dreaver.

"Whoever enters the Way without a guide will take a hundred years to travel a two-day journey." --Rumi The teaching in this book is based on nondual wisdom. It is called nondual because ultimately, there is no difference between the spiritual and the material. It is all one reality. The nondual approach is also known as the direct path to awakening. It confronts the one obstacle to true inner freedom--the belief in the sense of "I" or "me" as having a real, separate existence apart from consciousness--and reveals it to be the illusion that it is. The world between our ears, in other words, the world of "I," "me," and "mine" is not real. It is a fabrication, a story we have spent a lifetime making up and believing. By inwardly examining our thoughts, beliefs, reactions, and ideas about ourselves, we begin to realize our personal stories are always changing. The more we see this, the more the internal drama falls away. When we are simply present with our breathing, our body sensations and feelings, and our immediate environment itself, the story lets go of us. We start to know ourselves as the pure, luminous awareness which sees and experiences reality here and now, including the stories we tell ourselves. This knowing may be somewhat intellectual at first, but gradually it becomes embodied. More and more frequently it becomes our lived experience, and manifests as a feeling of ease, flow, and relaxed yet alert presence. As our head clears and our heart opens further, we awaken to the true beauty and meaning of life. (from The Introduction )

"A great story and the only one I've read that so daringly combines the spiritual with the explicitly erotic… The sex scenes are hot! "Ken Dvoren, Santa Monica, CaliforniaThe Unexpected Goddess is set in northern California in the summer of 2008, and tells the story of how the narrator, Steven Bergman, a successful writer and teacher of the art of awakening to spiritual freedom, met and fell in love with the beautiful Annie Morgan.As Bergman writes in Chapter “Like any good story, it has elements of drama to it, because Annie was in the last stages of recovering from a broken heart and shattered trust when I met her. So, in many ways, this is a story of healing and redemption, but it is also a story of self-discovery and self-realization, of sexual awakening and spiritual liberation, because Annie was living out of a very confining story when we met, a story that had been programmed into since before she came into this world.”In the italicized pages between the book’s chapters, Bergman also tells his own how he was born to Jewish parents in New York; how his mother, the sole survivor of her family in the Holocaust, lived with her own inner demons, and eventually, when Bergman is away at college in California, commits suicide; and how he then joins the army, goes to Vietnam, and experiences the ‘baptism by fire’ he wanted there.He then returns to the U.S. attends Chiropractic College, gets married, and becomes a successful chiropractor in Sebastopol, California. During this time he embarks on his own spiritual journey, to which he dedicates himself, with the result that he finally becomes enlightened, or free. But then he suffers a major stroke, which turns his life upside down. How he handles this event is lesson for anyone experiencing a crisis.The “story” that was programmed into Annie was the Mormon story. She was raised a fourth-generation, very devout Mormon woman. She graduated from Brigham Young University, where she met her husband, Warren. They had a sealed marriage in the Provo temple, and set about starting a big family. But although Annie had three pregnancies, she also had three miscarriages. Because she cannot give him any children, Warren, after ten years, demands and gets a divorce. Annie is devastated by this turn of events.Now, a year after her divorce, she has decided to come to northern California to find herself. She is questioning everything she has ever been taught, including all her religious beliefs. As part of this questioning, she is reading a book she bought at a spiritual bookstore in Sebastopol—You Are Not Your Story, by Steven Bergman.When the novel begins, it is this book, his book, that Bergman finds her reading when he walks into Lucas Wharf Restaurant in Bodega Bay for lunch on a mid-week afternoon, and sees her there, sitting in the lounge area. Thus begins their tale…

Sharing the secrets of his own spiritual journey, Jim Dreaver offers insight into achieving fulfilment and suggests ways of attaining personal peace without years of training or having to give up a modern lifestyle.

FALLING INTO LIGHT is a magical, heart-warming story about the meaning of love, death, and reincarnation.Jake Bennett, fifteen years old, is still devastated by the tragic loss of his parents a year ago. When the novel begins, we find him running through a redwood forest near the northern California town of Occidental, where he lives, literally trying to outrun his pain.Then he stumbles upon an unusual cat named Maya, who leads him down a mysterious path to a clearing, where an old woman named Bertie is quietly working in her garden. Bertie sees Jake’s pain and opens her heart to him. She takes him into her arms, and together they embark on a healing journey filled with light and magic.Bertie introduces Jake to the spiritual wisdom of her late husband, an African-American named Meriweather. As the story unfolds, we see the heaviness in Jake’s heart fall away as he reconnects with the source of love and wholeness within him. At the same time, he is given a dramatically new perspective on where we come from, why we are here, and what happens when we die.Just at the point where it seems Bertie has helped him find the answers to all his questions, their journey comes to an unexpected end. At first, the shock of this turn of events seems to threaten everything Jake learned from Bertie.But the novel ends with a surprise twist reinforcing what Bertie showed him. There is a divine power, mystery, and grace to life which, when we open to it and trust it, lights the path before us and guides us every step of the way.ABOUT THE AUTHORJim Dreaver, a native of New Zealand, was on a spiritual quest for twenty years before finally discovering the love and inner freedom which are his true nature. His main guide was European Advaita master Jean Klein, whom he first met in 1984.His most recent nonfiction eBook, also available on Kindle, is END YOUR STORY, BEGIN YOUR LIFE, which is a guide to realizing enlightenment, awakening, or inner freedom.Jim’s gift is inspiring people to be awake, present, and in their true power. He lives in Los Angeles, California, and travels widely to share his message, including teaching at Esalen Institute. His next Esalen workshop, titled Awaken to Freedom, is July 5 – 10, 2009. Visit www.esalen.org to register.He also offers private sessions to serious seekers, the fastest way to become free. Visit www.jimdreaver.com, email jdreaver@aol.com, or call 707-217-6451.He is also the author of THE WAY OF HARMONY (Avon, 1999), THE ULTIMATE CURE (Llewellyn, 1995), both of which are available used from www.amazon.com, and SOMATIC TECHNIQUE (Wild Goose Press, 1993), a manual for chiropractors, body workers, and massage therapists, written while Jim was himself a chiropractor, and available fort $24.95 through www.somatictechnique.com.