Doves Fly in My Heart is one woman's courageous journey of emerging from a life that no longer felt worth living to reclaim her spirit and create a new life of joy and meaning. A combination of personal memoir, insider's cultural guide and spiritual passage, we're taken inside the culture of an Andean world usually not seen by casual tourists on the way to Machu Picchu. Lisa shares her personal experiences and insights in a truly elegant, sensual style that immediately pulls readers into a deep, literacy embrace. Doves Fly in My Heart takes place in four parts. The first part describes the six years of the author's travel, healing and personal experiences prior to moving permanently to Peru. She makes what she thinks will be a once-in-a-lifetime visit to Peru, while recovering from a broken marriage and the realization that the life that society has told her would make her happy, has instead brought her deep anxiety and adversity. In Cusco, Peru she enters into the world of shamanism, working with the visionary plant spirit medicines Ayahuasca and Wachuma (San Pedro) and begins a journey towards healing her life and broken heart. She returns to her world and teenage children in the USA and tries to re-enter life and culture there, only to find that she deeply longs for Peru. She goes back and forth between the USA and Peru, sharing her numerous adventures and the challenges of her life with teenagers before eventually deciding that she prefers the lifestyle that she finds in Peru. Part two, "An Insider's Guide to the Andean Culture", is the culmination of her years of experience of living in the high Andes, in a Hispanic culture with deep roots in the indigenous culture of the Inca. She shares her insights of everything from how to live at very high altitudes and stay healthy (Cusco is at 11,000 feet above sea level and this information is particularly valuable to people planning on extended stays in the Andes), to favorite typical Andean cuisines, to how to understand the different cultural tendencies of time, space and honesty, and even "How to Minimize Your Chances of Getting Robbed". In part three she shares her personal experiences of navigating this newfound culture in the four years after her permanent move to Peru, relating her impressions of the surprisingly different attitudes, using humor and a sincere honesty. Here she shares the sounds of the culture, the possibility of new romance and discovers that the new person that living in this culture allows her to become must also learn how to avoid the pitfalls of this new terrain. Part four focuses on the specifics of the Andean Spiritual Path and the author's experiences in it. She explains the basics of this path as taught to her by the Q'ero, an indigenous tribe living at over 15,000 feet above sea level, who are considered to the be the direct bloodline descendants of the Inca and have maintained what many feel are the most powerful and purest shamanic and mystical beliefs and traditions. She travels to their villages, learning their ways and visiting their snow-capped, sacred mountains, participating in their ceremonies and initiations. She becomes godmother to one family and recounts her experiences in assisting them as they learn to navigate their way into the present culture in Peru, essentially making the leap of 500 years in one generation. At the end is a References section where one can learn more about the plant spirit medicines that are legally available in Peru. There are also details on how to access the various people and places described in the book, including recommended reading, websites and a glossary of words used in the book.
Lisa McClendon Sims was born in the USA and has lived in five different states, mainly Florida and California. She has also spent 7 years living in England and Europe. She is mother to 2 children, plus grandchildren. Lisa has been coming to Peru since 2005 and has lived in Peru since 2011. She is a Paqo, Chakaruna and Pampamisayoq in the Andean tradition, a Fourth Level initiate of the Hatun Karpay by Elizabeth Jenkins and Juan Nuez del Prado. She is also a Reiki Master and a student of A Course in Miracles. For more information and photos of the people and places referred to in this book please contact Lisa at www.SpiritualJourneysPeru.com or DovesFlyInMyHeart@gmail.com
