29.12.11

Winter Book Trailers




Hello Friends,

Curl up with that mug of hot chocolate
on these cold snowy days of December ...


Now you can view my book trailers anytime:
www.videos.emilyisaacson.com

Emily




22.12.11

The Legend of The Fleurs de Lys


Well I have received a record number of Christmas cards this year, and among them, a card with the legend of the fleurs de lys on the back. I have posted this on my Institute website because I think this information is very significant about the nature of how history repeats itself: 


The Fleurs de lys:  Commemorating the marriage of the Duke of Bedford to Anne of Burgundy, the manuscript was given as a Christmas gift to their nephew, nine-year-old Henry VI in 1430.
~
The British Library, Add. MS 18850, f.288v
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
My book the Fleur-de-lis was given to Prince William after his wedding to Kate Middleton, and the original manuscripts were sent to him as Christmas gifts in 2005, 2006, and 2008. 

This book was published by Tate Publishing (2017 note: Tate Publishing is now in transition, and the book is not currently available).




Wishing everyone a Wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year from the Emily Isaacson Institute!

Emily

22.7.11

The Magical Box of Candy

When I was young, there were five children in my family and we were read to each night before bed. We got to choose a "fairy story" to be read by one of my parents. It just so happened one night that we read a story about a little girl who received from the fairies a "magical box of candy". As long as she did not eat any other candy all day, she was allowed to choose one candy from the box and the fairies refilled it for her. My mother thought of the idea for us to have a magical box of candy as well. As long as we did not eat any candy all day, every night after dinner we were allowed to choose one piece of sugar-free candy from the box. The sugar-free part went along with her years of well intentioned sugar-free baking and healthy eating to encourage our wholesomeness. So there we were, and it seemed like a wonderful piece of fairy magic had descended on our household too. No more sugar candy of any sort, but a magical box that replenished itself... this went on for quite some time to our delight.

Now as an adult I can say that I run a sugar-free household myself. With all the sugar substitutes you can find today at health food stores, such as molasses, agave, maple syrup, fruit juice, honey, stevia, or xylitol, it isn't too difficult to create recipes that taste just as good, without the refined white sugar. Even whole cane juice can be purchased for 1:1 baking exchanges, or evaporated cane juice, which has the texture of icing sugar. Children do much better in school without the sugar overload so common with pop, candy, cake and even bread containing sugar. To teach them healthy eating choices is something they will carry with them for a lifetime. You can make the very same products without sugar, and they taste just as good. Buy healthy snacks in health food stores instead, and you will find, as I say in my grocery store tours, "the items you buy in a health food store are generally made with ingredients from the health food store..." and you will notice these common substitutions for refined fats, refined sugars, and refined flours.

To learn more about eating healthfully, check out my food program online: www.therainbowprogram.com and take your tablespoon of molasses daily for both iron and calcium.

Emily

16.5.11

The Dancing Years

A couple times a year I have the opportunity of attending my niece's dance recitals at Chandos Pattison Auditorium. The company is called Dance Barn Studios, and is located in Fort Langley. What dedication of some to pursue such talents to their end, in both performing and teaching the beauty of dance to others.

I started taking ballet when I was five, and attended dance classes until I was finished high school. As a teenager, every week I would take the bus downtown to the YMCA with my tights and ballet shoes and practice at the barre. This for me was the high moments of a young girl's life, the dedication and resilience needed to be graceful on stage, in the studio, and in person. It spills over into every part of life if you are a dancer, if you are meant to dance. The dance captured me as a ten year old, and I wanted to be part of the National Ballet at a young age. I read books about Anna Pavlova, the young ballerina, and tried to copy difficult dance moves. To master them I would practice in the swimming pool, which slows down movement and articulates the motions, and it worked magic. The older girls I knew who could do ballet moves that I could not, I copied underwater until I could do them also.

I was part of a performing dance troupe in high school, and we practiced and performed locally and did dance numbers at churches, schools and  fairs. I also did several summer intensive performing arts trips, and travelled across Europe doing song & dance in 1992. I spent a week in Spain during the '92 Olympics and three weeks in Germany, doing three performances a day. Back then, I was adventurous and it gained me a solo role, so I opened each performance singing the opening song.

By the time I was in university, I had leaned a fair amount of Israeli dancing and taught Israeli dancing to a small team of TWU dancers to perform for the school and at a few other venues. Dance has and will always be my choice instead of group sports or other exercise: it is beautiful, expressive, cathartic, and brings discipline with a measured practiced result.

When in doubt, dance to liberate the soul in every dimension. 

Emily

27.3.11

Victoria

I grew up in Victoria, a very British city, full of tourist attractions and the honeymooners' seashore. “The Dashwood” mentioned in my book, “a bulwark beside the shore”, is a wonderful manor bed and breakfast that I have stayed in several times, located on the sea front and park ridge of the downtown, a veritable destination. I have always loved the poetry of Victoria, the place of flowers, a remarkable change from Ontario where I was born. The first thing I noticed as a six year old in Victoria was the daffodils, then the flowering fruit trees, then the flowering baskets downtown, and then the Butchart Gardens. Our family home always had a front flower bed profuse with daffodils. How precise that now my humanitarian motto is “one daffodil per village” with the intent to reach out to every country and facilitate a holistic infrastructure.

The fine fragrance of poetry, summed up in "The Fragrance of Glory", speaks of a time of freedom, a time when heaven prevailed over the things and places of earth. And his Kingdom, as it touches our world becomes manifest in the spiritual dimension of visiting another country and facing its poverty, then returning home and facing our own. For we tap the riches of his glory among the poor, in their understanding of a spiritual world which feeds them. I left my life of nobility and title once, and went to live among the poor. I was the Madonna of the streets. I lived amongst the street people of Maple Ridge for three years, and conceded to their request for counterpoint. I played the grand piano for the hungry and homeless of the Salvation Army over the lunch meal.

I believe that in this time there is a prophetic harvesting of the earth, and the hungry are just waiting for something to draw and ask them in, to fill their souls with a spiritual meal of satisfying dimensions, to challenge their dreams, and call out their destinies. If I was Mary, birthing a son in this culture I would say that “He is innocent” of that which is evil. The premise of my book, was in part, that I have suffered, and I am also innocent as a child of God. No one wants to suffer their own martyrdom though, we would prefer anything else, yet we must not fall away in times of persecution. We must pray that he will keep us blameless and true to his purpose, so we become the fullness of his dream in us.

I have chosen to stay in my spiritual journey alongside the nuns of St. Clare, and in many ways my life has emulated that of St. Clare’s: following the path of chastity and the convent, shutting herself in the church and choosing a life of poverty and hard work. In this way, I also believe the flower St. Clare holds in her picture, if that of three lilies, represents THE FLEUR-DE-LIS.