Wild Mercy

"Mirabai embodies love, generosity, and wisdom. Her work and words compel us to be more, do better, love more fiercely, open our hearts and let the light in, and out." --Mona Haydar, activist, rapper, poet, chaplain "The Great Mother is a Mystery . . . known only through surrender. Surrender only happens through Grace. Mirabai Starr leads us deep into the radiance of the many ways the Goddess reveals herself, illuminating our Path back home." --Krishna Das, Kirtan master and author of Chants of a Lifetime and Flow of Grace "I was with Mirabai the day before her daughter Jenny died. Over the years, the intense outpouring of love from her mother's heart has led Mirabai to the wild mercy she drinks in and shares from all the women mystics, poets, and teachers gathered together in this gorgeous book. With free-spirited passion, erudition, and blazing candor, Mirabai generously offers the joys, sorrows, and insights of her own fully lived life as a particularly female path to the vast universal life we share. Mirabai's writing is magic, transforming the salt of tears into the fruit of wisdom and compassion." --Trudy Goodman, PhD, founding teacher at InsightLA and cofounder of the Institute for Meditation and Psychotherapy in Boston "I've been waiting for a book like this for a long time! Wild Mercy is a profound and exquisite glimpse into the wisdom, power, and love of the women mystics. The most pressing need of our time is for the wisdom of the feminine to be heard. Mirabai Starr's beautiful contribution allows everyone to hear those voices loud and clear! Highly recommended!" --Marci Shimoff, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Happy for No Reason and Chicken Soup for the Woman's Soul "Mirabai Starr invites us to a sacred fiesta in a wild wood--my idea of a great gathering. It all feels, as she says, inexhaustibly holy. She has a deliciously rich vocabulary and mastery of language, which she spills out over the pages. Her friends, the women mystics, teach us that everything is holy--herbs, water, fire, the body, every last thing. We so need this book, our world yearning for wisdom to balance the benefits and disasters of patriarchy--in religious and spiritual tradition as well as secular ones. The world will experience a rush of gratitude when this book is published." --Mirabai Bush, Senior Fellow, Center for Contemplative Mind in Society, and author of Walking Each Other Home (with Ram Dass) "It would be difficult to find a more trustworthy guide of the feminine mystics than Mirabai. In Wild Mercy, Mirabai's writing will lovingly pierce your consciousness, illuminating pathways that draw you far below and beyond what you thought you knew about spirituality and humanity, masculinity and femininity, and truth and grace. But even more than her beautiful writing, Mirabai's soulful guidance will lead you on a transformative cross-cultural journey as you traverse the sacred stories and wisdom of a diverse spectrum of feminine mystics. Importantly, her careful study of and sensitivity to social inequality and power dynamics enables her to highlight the deep spiritual wisdom that lies in other cultures without veering into ethnotourism. Rather, she invites readers to relinquish Western biases and entitlements as they faithfully drink from the waters that have nourished souls all over the world." --Christena Cleveland, associate professor, Duke Divinity School "Mirabai Starr has gifted us over the years with lively translations of the mystics and other blessings, but with this new book she outdoes herself! Wild Mercy is Starr's chef d'oeuvre--in it she wrestles with one of the most important signs of hope to combat the cynicism and despair that mark our times. I speak of the rise of women and women's consciousness, and Starr goes to the source--to the great women mystics West and East--to awaken us and instruct us in what has been lacking under Patriarchy.

Mirabai Starr taught philosophy and world religions at the University of New Mexico, and is the author of God of Love, Caravan of No Despair, and other acclaimed works. She lives in New Mexico. For more, visit mirabaistarr.com.