Spirituality

The Quiet Rebellion: A Spiritual Journey Back to Self

For empathetic souls, daily self-care isn’t optional—it’s vital. When nurtured with intention, your sensitivity becomes your greatest strength. There was a time I believed it was my duty to ease the pain of everyone around me.

However, healing doesn’t come from rescuing—it comes from allowing.

In learning this, I’ve reclaimed parts of myself that were lost to codependency. I live with an open heart and a spirit attuned to more profound truths.

My empathy, intuition, and connection to something greater guide me.

I long for soul-level connections, not surface encounters.

Compassion doesn’t come with an off-switch for me.

I feel everything—sometimes too much.

It’s not just about caring; it’s about managing what I take in, so I don’t lose myself in the emotions of others.

I’ve lived with […]

By Doré Frances|2025-06-17T11:17:18-06:00June 17th, 2025|Spirituality, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments

The Quiet Gift of Writing From the Soul

Like most meaningful exchanges, receiving a gift that stirs something profound within can awaken a sense of purpose. For me, the idea of writing this blog was just that—a gift.

I had just stepped into retirement, feeling tender, open, and hopeful about offering something of light to others. It took two years of reflection before I found the clarity to begin and give shape to what I envisioned.

From the moment I started, this blog has become my guide, teaching me as much as I’ve tried to offer through it. As I wrote, a few entries at a time, I found myself on a journey I hadn’t expected. The support I imagined would come from friends never quite arrived.

Instead, my deep connection […]

By Doré Frances|2025-06-14T11:27:34-06:00June 14th, 2025|Dore Frances, Spirituality, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments

Near Death Experience: Surviving My Stepmother’s Abuse: A Story of Pain, Silence, and Strength – Series

The trauma inflicted by my stepmother echoed through every corner of my childhood. I was nine when my mother died. Two years later, George and I met our stepmother, Dotti, and our two half-brothers, Rick and Ron.

Ron was born the day after our mother died—October 15, 1962.

That date would take on deeper meaning in the years to come.

From the very beginning, Dotti made her resentment of us clear. Her abuse was constant and unrelenting.

She struck out physically—yanking my hair, slapping my face, locking me in closets, and denying me meals.

Her true cruelty lay in her emotional warfare: calculated, relentless, and all-consuming.

There was no respite, no safe moment. Her […]

By Doré Frances|2025-10-04T13:41:50-06:00June 1st, 2025|1161 Covington Road, Dore Frances, Near Death Experiences, Near Death Experiences, Spirituality, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments

Near Death Experience: The Ocean Took Me: My First Near-Death Experience as a Child – Series

It was 1959, under a sky dappled with clouds, when I spent a carefree afternoon at the beach with my aunt Dorothy, cousins, brother George, and mom.

The waves’ rhythm, the sand’s warmth, and the promise held by the distant horizon enchanted me. As George and I strolled along the shoreline, we searched for seashells and driftwood treasures. I glanced down, mesmerized by the frothy seafoam swirling around my ankles as the tide rolled in with quiet grace.

I closely watched the shoreline, hoping the waves might reveal a hidden treasure just for me. George lingered a few steps ahead, scanning the surf.

And then—everything changed.

A wall of water crashed […]

By Doré Frances|2025-10-04T13:42:17-06:00May 31st, 2025|Dore Frances, Near Death Experiences, Spirituality, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments

Woodstock: The Liberation Years: Spirituality, Intimacy, and the Revolution of the ’60s – Series

This is the first post in a series about the boldest adventure of my youth—running away at sixteen to attend Woodstock.

Some Sixties veterans compare Burning Man and iconic hippie gatherings like Woodstock, the Trips Festival of January 1966, the Summer of Love, and the Human Be-In in Golden Gate Park the following year.

The parallels are unmistakable: Burning Man and those early countercultural events embraced free love, wild costumes, audience participation, and the exuberant spirit of loud music and psychedelics.

I experienced Woodstock firsthand, though I’ve never attended Burning Man.

To me, Woodstock carried a deeper power. We were a community of mellow, free-spirited hippies, gentle in our energy. From what I’ve heard from those who’ve experienced it, Burning Man combines a different […]

By Doré Frances|2025-10-04T13:46:27-06:00April 27th, 2025|Dore Frances, Spirituality, The Sixties and Seventies Counterculture, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think, Woodstock 1969 Series|0 Comments

Truth Isn’t Always Black and White: Embracing Life’s Gray Areas

The Truth Isn’t Always Black And White

We’re not here to agree with everyone but to coexist with compassion.

That means respecting others’ life paths and personal, political, or spiritual choices. Life doesn’t offer one truth for all.

Our beliefs grow with us—molded by our circumstances, culture, and personal stories. It’s no wonder we each see right and wrong through a different lens.

We all walk different paths, shaped by our truths.

Honoring someone else’s reality doesn’t diminish your own—it expands it.

Our version of truth may feel absolute, yet someone living a different life, in a different place or time, may see things in reverse—and still be right.

Embracing this possibility invites humility, patience, and the grace to forgive.

Tolerance DOES NOT mean enduring what is harmful.

Sometimes […]

By Doré Frances|2025-06-08T15:37:00-06:00April 22nd, 2025|Dore Frances, Frances Cascinai (Mom), Spirituality, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments

From Liberation to Disillusionment: A Personal Journey Through the Spiritual and Social Upheaval of the ’60s and ’70s

Sexual liberation was at the heart of the social and spiritual upheaval of the 1960s and ’70s. With the advent of the Pill, intimacy was no longer tethered to reproduction—and everything began to shift.

Divorce shed its stigma, and single-parent households, for better or worse, became common across all walks of life. Once rigid in its doctrines, even religion began to loosen its grip, offering a more flexible, no-fault approach to faith.

Psychedelic drugs were a defining force in the counterculture of the 1960s and ’70s. Substances like LSD, magic mushrooms, mescaline, and peyote propelled countless baby boomers into altered states of consciousness—brief but profound journeys into expanded awareness and a deep sense of interconnectedness.

It’s an experience I’ve never forgotten and, if […]

By Doré Frances|2025-04-14T11:04:42-06:00April 14th, 2025|Dore Frances, Spirituality, The Sixties and Seventies Counterculture, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments

Living in the Redwoods: A Tribe, a Guru, and a Truth I Couldn’t Ignore

We watched the last of them drift out the door, laughter echoing faintly as the house finally quieted. Another long, lazy party had come and gone in our rambling house just beyond Big Basin State Park, tucked in the Santa Cruz Mountains off Highway 9. We were about 45 minutes from Santa Cruz, living amid the towering Coastal Redwoods—some of the most awe-inspiring trees on earth, found nowhere else but California.

The house was a sprawling 5,000-square-foot haven on eight acres, with a vegetable garden out front, composting toilets, a deep well we had to monitor, propane for heat, and a gas stove that got heavy use. An expansive wooden deck wrapped halfway around the […]

By Doré Frances|2025-04-12T11:13:52-06:00April 5th, 2025|Dore Frances, Relationships, Spirituality, The Sixties and Seventies Counterculture, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments