Finding freedom is a life-long aspiration that lights our way out of hell. The 7 Footsteps and 7 Prayers unlock a kinder, gentler and long-lasting engine for transformation. As we leave hell behind, we unlock and unchain all that prevents us from being worthy of love.

Rise to the Sun: 7 Footsteps and 7 Prayers for Getting Out of Hell is a gentle nonfiction book filled with powerful art and images, prayers and stories about what the journey to freedom means to people of all walks of life. It gives us a much-needed return to purity.

This book delves into transforming ourselves before we can transform the world. The 7 Footsteps and 7 Prayers assert a format for change: we are ready to reprogram ourselves, rather than be programmed by outside forces.

The 7 Footsteps symbolize the way forward-personally, collectively or spiritually. The book plays with travel and journey in two senses-forward on a physical road and into the heart of the self. It illustrates that the art of living is learning to be good to ourselves. The author, along with the brave women and men who open up their stories and teachings, are our living teachers. Each has struggled with trauma and grief to actualize new ways of seeing life and gaining freedom.

Works of art by Ida O'Keeffe, Norman Rockwell, Zhang Xiaogang, Andrei Rublev, Bo Bartlett, Antoine Watteau, Lawren Harris, Winslow Homer, and Odilon Redon emphasize the purpose of each chapter and footstep as a way of action and reflection.

Guiding us to feel safe in the face of change, this book includes stories and insights from diverse personalities such as Nancy B. Black, MD, Colonel, US Army, Retired; Tamara Buchwald, Attorney; Kathy Eldon, Founder, Creative Visions; Tim McHenry, Chief Programmatic Officer, Rubin Museum of Art; Winsome McIntosh, President, The McIntosh Foundation; JoAnn Wright Milliken, Ph.D., Senior Executive, US Department of Energy, Retired; Jessica Rockwood, President, International Public Health Advisors; Marc-Olivier Strauss-Kahn, Trustee, The American University of Paris; The Rev. Eva Suarez, Associate Rector, St. James' Church; Tom Vendetti, Ph.D., Psychologist and Emmy-winning filmmaker.

The Prayers by C.L. Sulzberger, Padraig O Tuama, Hermann Hesse, Nancy B. Black, MD, Colonel, US Army, Retired, the Iroquois/Haudenosaunee Confederacy, The Mother (Mirra Alfassa), Annie Besant, and Richard J. Marks give us something to do: they guide us actively toward seeing what needs to be released, surrendered, completed, forgiven and cherished. They also bring us into the heart.

Cover design by Gjorgji Pejkovski. Interior design by Zoran Maksimovic.