For a very long time, and well before I wrote Courageous Souls, I had been searching, fruitlessly, for the deeper meaning of my life.

In 2003, my search took a new and surprising turn when I decided to consult with a medium. Although I had a strong belief in God, I had never (as far as I knew) directly experienced the metaphysical. I researched mediums and selected someone with whom I felt comfortable.

My session with the medium took place on May 7, 2003. I remember the exact date because on that day my life changed. I told the medium very little about myself, describing my circumstances only in the most general terms. She explained that each of us has spirit guides, nonphysical beings with whom we plan our lives prior to incarnation. Through her I was able to speak with mine. They knew everything about me—not only what I had done but also what I had thought and felt. For example, they referred to a specific prayer I had said to God some five years earlier. At a particularly difficult time I had prayed, “God, I can’t do this alone. Please send help.” My guides told me that additional nonphysical assistance had been provided. “Your prayer was answered,” they said. I was astounded.

Eager to understand the suffering I had experienced, I asked my guides about the major challenges I had faced. They explained that I had planned these challenges before birth—not for the purpose of suffering, but for the growth that would result. I was shaken by this information. My conscious mind knew nothing of pre-birth planning, yet intuitively I sensed truth in their words.

Although I did not realize it at the time, my session with the medium triggered a profound spiritual awakening for me. I would later understand that this awakening was really a remembering—a remembering of who I am as an eternal soul and, more specifically, what I had planned to do on Earth.

I became obsessed with reading about spirituality and metaphysics. As I read I thought often about pre-birth planning. All my life I had viewed my challenges as nothing more than meaningless suffering. Had I known that I’d planned my challenges, I would have seen them rich with purpose. That knowledge alone would have greatly eased my suffering. Had I also known why I’d planned them, I could have consciously learned the lessons they offered.

During this period of intense study and inner exploration, I met a woman is able to channel her soul and who agreed to let me speak with her soul about pre-birth planning. I had no knowledge of channeling and was taken aback when she went into a trance and another consciousness, one clearly distinct from hers, began to speak through her. I spoke with her soul for fifteen hours over the course of five meetings.

These conversations were thrilling. They verified and complemented my reading and study. Her soul told me in detail about her own pre-birth planning: the various challenges that had been discussed and the reasons some were selected. Here I had direct, specific confirmation of a phenomenon of which very few people were aware. Because the pain in my life had made me extremely sensitive to—and intensely motivated to relieve—the suffering of others, I was excited by the potential healing an awareness of pre-birth planning could bring to people. I knew that the information I had discovered could lighten their suffering and imbue their challenges with new meaning and purpose. As a result I resolved to write a book about the subject and to share its significance with others.

Working closely with several mediums and channels, I spent the next three years studying the pre-birth plans of dozens of individuals. I learned that the events in their lives were neither random nor arbitrary, but rather part of a wisely conceived and intricate plan—a plan they themselves had bravely designed. I learned, too, that souls often select very different challenges for similar reasons. You may therefore hear the motivations of your soul in the story of someone whose life is, at least on the surface, very different from your own. In Courageous Souls I offer to you ten of these life stories and pre-birth plans.

These stories speak, I believe, to our heartfelt, universal yearning to know . . . why?

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