Enchanted Love

Three of Marianne Williamson's previous best-sellers -- "A Return to Love, A Woman's Worth, " and "Illuminata" -- explored the issue of relation- ships. Now, in this deeply personal collection of essays, prayers, and self- reflection, she turns to romantic love.

"Enchanted Love" envisions a way of being in love with another person and at peace and at one with God and with ourselves. It envisions a reinvention of romantic love as our newest spiritual frontier. In "Illuminata" Williamson wrote that "we experience God to the extent to which we love, forgive, and focus on the good in others and ourselves." Now, in "Enchanted Love, " she writes that "enchanted partnership begins with the conscious understanding, on the part of two people, that the purpose of their relationship is not so much material as spiritual, and the internal skills demanded by it are prodigious." High romance, she says, "is not about past or future. It is not about practicality. It is not about society or worldly routines. It is an audacious ride to the center of what is, at the heart of every person. It is a bold and masterful inquiry into what two people really are and how we might become, while still on earth, the angels who reside within us."

Filled with parables and references to classic myths and legends of love, "Enchanted Love" also contains some of Williamson's beautiful signature prayers to help readers -- single or coupled -- meditate and awaken to the possibilities of romantic enchantment within themselves and with their partners. We can only experience what we are willing to acknowledge, Williamson writes, as she guides us on a sacred journey from our disenchanted worlds to a paradise on earth,where we and our loved ones can give and receive enchanted love.