ESCAPED is a thought-provoking book that explores cosmically unanswered questions and provides a unique perspective of reality. Why was this an important book for you to write?
I sometimes write my thoughts down and then discard them. However, I didn’t realize that one journal entry about one spiritual insight would be important enough to make into something else. Yet this piece almost immediately commanded me to expand on that one thought because it brought up questions I wanted answers to. I must have had a lot of questions because I kept writing until a big revelation about my own flaw, to use a loaded word, shouted out at me from the page. Once I calmed down I realized I wasn’t the only one with this flaw, and perhaps I should share the insight with others.
What were some ideas that were important for you to explore in this book?
The framework I chose to use includes concepts from Nikola Tesla, a few quotations, a sprinkling of scripture, and personal experiences as examples to guide the reader along my internal timeline, like traveling together on a road trip. The purpose of the structure is to allow readers, as much as is possible, to “experience” my internal journey beyond the words. I was also interested in finding a pattern to the unusual phenomena I encountered along my spiritual journey that became like puzzle pieces fitting together as I explored. The freedom aspect occurred, in a very palpable way, only after having got to the end of writing, and could not have been anticipated ahead of time.
What do you hope is one thing readers take away from your book?
That journaling about your own structure, and not following my framework, in whatever form that takes, is life-altering, life-affirming, and an honest, worthy pursuit.
Do you plan to write other books on this same topic?
No. My role now is to attempt to live the ideas that I wrote about, in a conscious way. The point of publishing and sharing ESC is to show how journaling helps others, by journaling themselves, with my book as an inspiration, not as a how-to. For instance, one reader said “I even felt inspired to write a parody song, and applied to get it copyrighted.” Pretty cool, right? Recently I began writing one-shot fiction stories in a metaphysical style that incorporate the ideas in ESC, and I may publish a collection next year. A few have already been published on Reedsy. Also, ESC (the condensed version of my title) is being translated to Italian this Summer.
Author Links: GoodReads | Reedsy | Website
Upon the death of her paternal grandmother when Mary LaForge was 7 years old, Mary walked into a house of worship all by herself and was not recognized by anyone. That sent Mary on a lifelong journey seeking God in traditional and non-traditional disciplines. Finally, letting go of the search, Mary dove inward to find her own unique truth.
