Elizabeth Lesser is the co-founder and senior adviser of Omega Institute, the largest adult education center in the United States focusing on health, wellness, spirituality and creativity. [1] She is the author of Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow [2] and A Seeker's Guide: Making Your Life a Spiritual Adventure. [3]
For more than 30 years, Lesser has studied and worked with leading figures in the fields of healing, spiritual development and cultural change. Her work at Omega has included co-directing the organization, curriculum research, conference weaving, teaching and writing the yearly Omega catalog, a reference book that describes the work of some of the most eminent thinkers and practitioners of our times. She has shared her work and teachings at TED [4] and on Oprah's Super Soul Sunday. [5]
Lesser attended Barnard College and San Francisco State University. Before Omega, she was a midwife and birth educator. She has been active in local environmental issues for many years in New York's Hudson Valley, where she lives with her husband. She is the mother of three sons.
Pema Chödrön is an American-born Tibetan Buddhist. She is an ordained nun, former acharya of Shambhala Buddhism and disciple of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche. Chödrön has written several dozen books and audiobooks, and was principal teacher at Gampo Abbey in Nova Scotia until recently. She retired in 2020.
Elizabeth Janet Gray Vining was an American professional librarian and author who tutored Emperor Akihito of Japan in English while he was crown prince. She was also a noted author, whose children's book Adam of the Road received the Newbery Medal in 1943.
Caroline Myss is an American author of 10 books and many audio recordings about mysticism and wellness. She is most well known for publishing Anatomy of the Spirit (1996). She also co-published The Creation of Health with Dr C Norman Shealy MD - ex Harvard professor of neurology. Her most recent book, Archetypes: Who Are You? was published in 2013. Myss describes herself as a medical intuitive and a mystic.
Oprah's Book Club was a book discussion club segment of the American talk show The Oprah Winfrey Show, highlighting books chosen by host Oprah Winfrey. Winfrey started the book club in 1996, selecting a new book, usually a novel, for viewers to read and discuss each month. In total, the club recommended 70 books during its 15 years.
Eckhart Tolle is a German-born spiritual teacher and self-help author. His books include The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment (1997), A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose (2005) and the picture book Guardians of Being (2009).
Susan Lynn "Suze" Orman is an American financial advisor, author, and podcast host. In 1987, she founded the Suze Orman Financial Group. Her work as a financial advisor gained notability with The Suze Orman Show, which ran on CNBC from 2002 to 2015.
Joan Daugherty Chittister,, is an American Benedictine nun, theologian, author, and speaker. She has served as Benedictine prioress and Benedictine federation president, president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, and co-chair of the Global Peace Initiative of Women.
Louise Lynn Hay was an American motivational author, professional speaker and AIDS advocate. She authored several New Thought self-help books, including the 1984 book You Can Heal Your Life, and founded Hay House publishing.
Iyanla Vanzant is an American inspirational speaker, lawyer, New Thought spiritual teacher, author, life coach, and television personality. She is known primarily for her books, her eponymous talk show, and her appearances on The Oprah Winfrey Show. From 2012 to 2021, she served as host of OWN's Iyanla: Fix My Life.
Elizabeth Gilbert is an American journalist and author. She is best known for her 2006 memoir Eat, Pray, Love, which has sold over 12 million copies and has been translated into over 30 languages. The book was also made into a film of the same name in 2010.
The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom is a self-help book by the author Don Miguel Ruiz. The book outlines a code of conduct based on Toltec teachings that purport to improve one’s life.
The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment is a book by Eckhart Tolle. It is a discussion about how people interact with themselves and others. The concept of self-reflection and presence in the moment are presented along with simple exercises for the achievement of its principles. Published in the late 1990s, the book was recommended by Oprah Winfrey and has been translated into 33 languages. As of 2009, it was estimated that three million copies had been sold in North America.
Omega Institute for Holistic Studies is a non-profit educational retreat center located in Rhinebeck, New York. Founded in 1977 by Elizabeth Lesser and Stephan Rechtschaffen, inspired by Sufi mystic, Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan and his ecumenical spirituality, today it offers classes to over 25,000 people a year, at the 190-acre (0.77 km2) campus.
Casandra Brené Brown is an American academic and podcaster who is the Huffington Foundation's Brené Brown Endowed Chair at the University of Houston's Graduate College of Social Work and a visiting professor in management at the McCombs School of Business in the University of Texas at Austin. Brown is known for her work on shame, vulnerability, and leadership, and for her widely viewed 2010 TEDx talk. She has written six number-one New York Times bestselling books and hosted two podcasts on Spotify.
Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail is the 2012 memoir by the American writer, author, and podcaster Cheryl Strayed. The memoir describes Strayed's 1,100-mile hike on the Pacific Crest Trail in 1995 as a journey of self-discovery. The book reached No. 1 on the New York Times Best Seller list, and was the first selection for Oprah's Book Club 2.0.
Debbie Ford was an American self-help author, coach, lecturer and teacher, most known for The New York Times best-selling book, The Dark Side of the Light Chasers (1998), which aimed to help readers overcome their shadow side with the help of modern psychology and spiritual practices. In following years, she went on to write eight more books including Spiritual Divorce, Why Good People Do Bad Things, and The 21-Day Consciousness Cleanse, which have sold over 1 million copies and been translated into 32 languages. She led workshops on "Shadow Process" and hosted TV and radio shows, and also established the "Ford Institute for Transformational Training".
Elizabeth Acevedo is an American poet and author. In September 2022, the Poetry Foundation named her the year's Young People's Poet Laureate.
Teal Swan is an American spiritual influencer and author. Swan and her teachings are the subject of documentaries and podcasts. Publications, including Eonline, The Guardian, and the BBC have noted that some of her teaching methods on how to manage mental health issues have been found controversial by her critics, a claim denied by Swan and some of her proponents.
The 2020 presidential campaign of Marianne Williamson, an author, was announced on January 28, 2019, after the initial formation of an exploratory committee on November 15, 2018. Williamson's bid for the Democratic nomination was her second political campaign, after previously running as an independent to represent California's 33rd congressional district in 2014. Prior to her candidacy, Williamson was known as "Oprah's spiritual adviser" due to her frequent appearances on The Oprah Winfrey Show.
Joyful Clemantine Wamariya is a Rwandan-American author, speaker, and human rights advocate.
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