Spirituality

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

From Bend to Boulder: A Journey of Spirit and Self

On August 1, 2011, I packed my Toyota Solara and left Bend, Oregon, bound for Colorado with my friend Jason. I had shipped a few of my larger belongings to his home, sold the rest, and fit everything I owned into the car.

The road ahead felt full of possibility — I was excited, curious, and maybe a little nervous.

What would life in Colorado be like?

What kind of energy would Boulder hold?

Jason had offered me a place to stay until I got settled, and while I didn’t know how long that might take, I was grateful for the chance to land somewhere soft.

By Doré Frances|2025-04-04T12:04:52-06:00April 4th, 2025|Bend, Oregon, Dore Frances, Spirituality, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments

Esalen: A Spiritual Journey Through Big Sur

My recollection begins at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California—the cradle of the human potential movement and the place where the spiritual energy of the Sixties first took hold along the California coast.

Esalen is more than a retreat center; it’s founded on the idea that human consciousness and potential constantly evolve.

The spirituality of the Sixties resembled a journey through comparative religion—a quest to find the mystical core shared by the world’s great faiths.

At Esalen, and within the broader Sixties spiritual movement, the focus wasn’t on believing in God.

It was about experiencing the divine firsthand.

I first visited Esalen in 1980, at the age of 27.

There, I encountered fellow baby boomers — Baptists, Catholics, Episcopalians, Jews, and Protestants — […]

By Doré Frances|2025-03-30T11:36:24-06:00March 30th, 2025|Dore Frances, Spirituality, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments

Do Signs from the Afterlife Exist?

Can we be sure something exists just because we believe it does? Consider a picture of a meal — the aroma, flavor, and texture aren’t captured, yet we still understand they’re part of the experience.

Our vision is limited to three dimensions—much like how a camera captures only two.

So whatever animates life likely exists beyond what most of us can perceive. The force that sustains us operates outside the reach of our five senses, remaining a mystery to many.

Yet, despite not fully understanding it, we trust in it, believing it will carry us into the next day. Whether we recognize it or not, we all live by faith.

We place immense trust in an invisible force—that the earth will keep turning, the […]

By Doré Frances|2025-03-29T11:07:27-06:00March 29th, 2025|Dore Frances, Frances Cascinai (Mom), Spirituality, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments

A Soul’s Journey: Embracing Life as a Sacred, Temporary Experience

We are wanderers in the ever-shifting landscape of existence, passing through this world like a breeze through leaves, touched by its beauty and shaped by its impermanence. This realm, with all its mystery and majesty, is not our final dwelling but a luminous waypoint on the unfolding journey of the soul. Our presence here is no accident.

We’ve come with the intention—to observe with open eyes, feel with open hearts, and awaken through the experiences life places in our path.

Each dawn carries a message, every encounter a mirror, and every hardship a quiet teacher. We are here to be changed—to let joy soften us, let sorrow refine us, and let life sculpt […]

By Doré Frances|2025-03-23T10:44:21-06:00March 23rd, 2025|Dore Frances, Spirituality, Why Wisdom Is Harder Than You Think|0 Comments