Barrie Dolnick

I was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin which, I like to think, was an accident. I was clearly meant to be born in a lovely village in the English Cotswolds sometime between the Wars (World not Bush). Nevertheless, I made the best of it, as one does.

Old ladies used to come up to me when I was small and point bony fingers in my face accusingly. "You have ancient eyes," they'd say. I did my best to ignore them. At four or five, you don't want anything to do with being ancient.

I was a bit older when I became captivated by the story of past lives in the movie "On a Clear Day You Can See Forever"(Barbra Streisand, 1970), but I continued to stay far away from any psychic phenomenon, issuing a condemning report of such things as palmistry and mind-reading in my junior high science class.

After earning a degree in business where the most powerful thing I learned was how very much I disliked it, I searched beyond the borders of the US for personal satisfaction and fulfillment. I lived in London where I worked in advertising, where intuition and strong liver paid off more than quantitative research. I learned a lot - how to drink at lunchtime (something I never really mastered although I certainly tried), how to listen to people and sift out what they really want to say, and how to survive in a world where the words didn't always match the pictures.

I moved on to a position in the New York office of the same agency, applying my skills to mass marketed makeup products. I was rewarded with free makeup and an advanced course in New York Night Life. I climbed ladders, enhanced my bank account and my corporate titles, and grew ever more discontent.

Mounting dissatisfaction with my career and my social life compelled me to search for fulfillment in different places. I knew that England would have to be part of it.

A friend recommended a respected metaphysics teacher to me, and, being less tough on the subject than I had been as a child, I made an appointment.

It worked.