Heather K. O'Hara

Heather O’Hara ~ A Beautiful Soul with “A Touch of Grace” and Style:

Heather’s story as written on her website, “Quantum Grace” ~ www.quantum-grace.com:

Heather K. O’Hara is an award-winning poet, a contributing editor for various publications and author of “Axis, The Song in the Center of the Soul”. Writing since she was old enough to hold a pen in her hand, her love of words and deep fascination with their rhythm and power have evolved into many collections of poetry; a number of children’s books; and a wealth of reflections, articles and short stories.

Growing up near Detroit, Michigan in the heart and heat of the Civil Rights Movement, her passion for writing was deeply influenced and empowered by the strong, eloquent voices of her cherished heroes: Martin Luther King, Jr., Jesse Jackson, and John F. Kennedy. Combined with her early love for reading the works of Shakespeare, Frost, Whitman, Keats, Emerson and Gibran, her words began to reflect a vision of the extraordinary world she found within the powerful voices of heroes and the quiet wisdom of the literary masters.

Writing remained her treasured companion as she went on to become a businesswoman, a wife and mother, a community volunteer teacher and a design consultant specializing in sacred interiors and peaceful, yet breathtaking landscapes.

Peacefulness became her motto: “Because peacefulness on any level helps to create and maintain peacefulness on every level. The art of balancing light and shadow, inside and out, not only helped me create beautiful harmonious environments for myself and others – it also taught me the value of spiritual integrity, revealing how our beliefs and feelings are reflected in everything and everyone around us. If I have learned only one thing from my experience as a designer, it is this: from simplicity, wholeness, and balance emerge all things truly divine; and to the degree these three qualities exist within us, is the degree to which they manifest themselves outside of us.”

Faced with the sudden challenge of a life-changing divorce just a few years ago, Heather O’Hara began the most painful, yet most empowering journey of her life:

“It’s as if I awoke one morning and found myself in a different movie. The only world I knew, the world I loved and trusted, was suddenly gone. I wasn’t prepared for it spiritually, mentally, or emotionally—I never once envisioned my entire universe collapsing in less than a day. Very quickly and very unexpectedly, everything I thought to be real, safe, and everlasting vanished in the blink of an eye.

There was absolutely nothing left but destruction and devastation, and I spiraled downward into a place I had never known before. Everywhere I turned, I felt as if I were stepping on landmines; it seemed that my world was exploding, splintering, and shattering all around me—and so I stopped stepping, I stopped speaking, I stopped eating, and I almost stopped breathing. All I wanted to do was disappear.

But I kept journals. And by the grace of a God, much more loving and powerful than I had ever realized, today, I am alive and well and I can honestly say, without a doubt, that the value of written expression is profoundly and patiently astounding.  At the time, I could not find the wise, spirited voice of the poet who once seemed to dwell within me—believe me, I had not one iota of wisdom, strength, or cleverness.  My words came out in broken pieces; they were small, pathetic, jagged bits of common drama, but I wrote and wrote and wrote until there was nothing left inside me but an empty page.

I wanted so desperately to be able to write something beautiful and powerful, but beauty and power cannot and do not emerge from desperation.  And so I filled page after page of my journals with that four-letter word called "pain," until miraculously, on a cold winter night, feeling exhausted and alone, my entire world as I knew it changed again.

By some mysterious plan far more intelligent than my own, I found myself gazing through a window, passively watching the snow fall through the pale light of a midnight moon.  From wherever thoughts come I began wondering about the perfection of it all, and as I did, I suddenly saw myself as part of that perfect winter artistry—so evident in the uninterrupted silence of moonlight and shadow and snow. It was then that I quietly picked up a pen and began to write a poem entitled Snow Song, a poem that arose from the knowledge and beauty in the center of my soul—a poem about myself, my own song, written by the real me, finally beginning to remember who I was.    

Writing Snow Song marked the turn in the road that eventually led me to where I am now, and I will never forget that night as long as I live.  I felt locked inside a dreamless world—financially devastated, feeling cold, hungry, and tired. I weighed 84 pounds; I was still barely able to speak, and yet something inside me was "singing," and I knew I was going to make it. 

For the first time in almost a year, I felt the burning desire to stand up and say my name.  I wanted to touch something other than deprivation and destruction; I wanted to hug my children with great strength and hope; and, more than anything, I wanted to live.

It took a tremendous amount of willingness, attention, and dedication to my own well-being and spiritual growth before I turned the corner from struggle to success, but I never gave up.  I learned to walk away from anything or anyone that didn’t empower, inspire, or encourage me to heal, feel, hear, see, and be.  I returned to the literary masters I had known and loved when I was younger, and I sought out every book I could find on rebuilding a life and creating a new and empowering world for myself and my children.

No matter what they believed in spiritually, my true friends supported my journey in every way they could, and more than ever before I felt surrounded by love and understanding. It may take one village to raise a child, but it took an entire universe, collectively, to raise me from the point at which I nearly vanished, and I will never forget the kindness and compassion of so many for so long. 

In my search for the rhyme and reason of my less-than-noble  circumstances, I must tell you that it was the work of two extraordinary authors that took me deeper and further into my own soul than I had ever dreamed possible.      

The books of Deepak Chopra and Wayne Dyer became my charts and maps as I navigated my way through sometimes terrifying and unknown territory.  I read everything I could find that either of them had ever published, and through their life’s work and eloquent guidance, I finally connected and bonded with the wisdom of my own soul.  Their words taught me forgiveness; they taught me understanding, compassion, and acceptance; they taught me to envision greatness—to believe in myself and to create from my heart.  But most important, they taught me, through the magic and power of written words, the true meaning of self-love.

These two brilliant authors became my "light" and in so doing, they helped save my life.  Their words lifted me up and carried me to higher places as they crept into the very core of my heart, bringing me the greatest gift of all—the gift of inner peace.

Because of their gifts I am here today, but a debt still remains.  In the great realm of Quantum Grace there exists a perfect system of law and order that I honor with every fiber of my being. One of these Universal Laws is that what is received in love from another must somehow be given back, multiplied. 

And so it is—through this website, through my own books, poetry, and reflections—with passionate presence, courage, and strength, I offer you what Deepak Chopra and Wayne Dyer gave to me; the gift of inspiring and empowering words from the center of the soul. Words of understanding, compassion, wholeness, love, and peace—straight from the heart of my own unfolding and ever-evolving world; a world that is cherished, revered and honored. For all of those in need, as I was, I offer you the music of my soul, the gift of Grace—multiplied.”