Cultivating Essence

13th Anniversary NEW BOOK RELEASE

Cultivating Essence from the Matrix of Soul is “a message in a bottle for the world” for our time of unprecedented change and unprecedented opportunity. Also called “a manual for the many” for our transition into “a new era, rich in love,” these anniversary editions of the Cultivating Essence book include core passages that combine brevity and boldness for a whole new you and a whole new way forward together.

Cultivating Essence from the Matrix of Soul is one of many books I have written. It is the only one that came to me whole and complete as mystery and beats in and through me as the pulse of life itself.

These 90 “seeds for life” were gifted to me by Spirit, entrusted to me that I might shepherd it and share them with the world. I often think I botched it.

After all, to share what is described as “a message in a bottle for the world” and “a manual for the many” is, to put it mildly, a bit of a big ask and a tall order—too much for this sensitive soul who has fond recollections of time spent in caves or sailing on the open sea.

Lucky Thirteen: Why, Exactly, Did It Take You So Long, Dawn?

I have done my best. But I have felt completely at a loss so many times for so many years.

I tried and tried to share. I failed and failed again.

What got in the way?

• My own feeling of unworthiness or blocks and barriers to love

• The videos and blog posts that didn’t resonate or connect or wouldn’t upload

• The website with all of this information posted for free that was hacked by some unknown foreign entity according to the hosting company years ago, before that was a thing

• The agents and publishers who “didn’t get it” or told me there was no market for such a thing or that so-and-so “had that market cornered”

• The shame and shackles others placed upon me and that I thought I was deserving of or believed in more than I believed in what is true of who I am and the ways God entrusted these gifts to me

• My own overwhelm with technology

• My brain, my body, my boldness, my belief that my best wasn’t good enough

• Me just trying to survive and eventually thrive in life

But I did my best and, if there is one silver lining, one little thing I’ve got going for me, it is that I am courageous and I have learned, the hard way, to get back up again—to try, try, try and to remember this girl is on fire and use everything that shows up, no matter what, to lead me back to the light, the life, and the love I am.

Note that the links to songs are not endorsements of the artists or their messages per se, but they are shared to illustrate the way I use all things to lead me back to what is true. This is the process I refer to as Life Refinement and is at the heart of the coaching I offer from time to time.

How I made it through to finally share this book with you . . .

In my heart of hearts, I am devoted to all things that are to me pure and innocent in their essence. And I truly believe in the depths of me that the whole of this message of cultivating from our core the light, life, and love we are does indeed “hold the potential for a new world.” So I wasn’t giving up.

Highlights on the long way round back to now . . .

First, trust me, I suggested a different title for the book ;) Spirit was having nothing of it. It had to be this, and the first entry had to be what it was and, no, I could not change the tone of one of the more potent messages.

Nor could I make parts of it “less cheeky” and “more serious.”

And try to mess with that lofty subtitle they thought was the only possibility?
No way, Dawn….

Now, don’t get me wrong, I have zero doubts whatsoever that this is a gift for humanity and for our time. That’s part of what I’ve been grappling with all these years.

It is a book that came THROUGH me and maybe is OF me in terms of my true essence.
Yet it is way BEYOND me.

Cultivating Essence from the Matrix of Soul is comprised of 90 core passages (the heart and soul of the “90 Days to Life” journey I’ve offered). The weird thing is they literally just showed up inside me all at once and completely tumbled me forward on a trajectory which to this day has me bobbing up and down in the river trying to keep up with it.

To say I took the long way round is sort of an understatement. But, like the series that saw me through the global pandemic with the same name (thank you, Long Way Round with Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman),

I first shared the 90 passages of Cultivating Essence in a small group in November 2011 and then as a PDF download (pictured below) on June 21, 2012, which was the point from which I knew there would be no turning back.

But ever since November of 2011—in spite of my prolific writing and sharing of many books, my own and through ghostwriting and developmental editing, those of many other authors—I have really struggled to hold the container to bring this message forward.

In many ways, it was my devotion to cultivating from MY core so I could water the world with the fullest expression of who I am that led me on a path back to life.

I have come to see that I had to live this message, to let it beat within me and allow it to bring me back to life first.

The reverberation of the words in this book had been echoing inside me from 1999 through the point I finally said yes in 2011, releasing it fully the following year on the Summer Solstice. But there was more work to do. Apparently, a lot more.

It took me so long I suppose because people already thought I was “crazy” or imbalanced. And for a million other little reasons that turned out to be less than the whole truth.

It is true that my system was overloaded, but not because of this.

It was more because I was always trying to stem the tide of the truth—my soul’s truth and radiance—that was welling up within me. For a time, that truth and its flood of memory full overwhelmed me.

So, due only to my own challenges or perceived challenges, this book has arrived in a form in which all persons can easily access it in what I am certain would be called “perfect timing” by my soul family in the spiritual realm.

You can preorder the book now.
Release day is July 14, 2025.

I’m in it for freedom and for love, and I’ll be here for the long haul, however long that is.

I hope the book offers encouragement and inspiration to you as you connect to the wholeness of who you are and who you’ve dome to be.

Dawn Richerson

Founder, Soul Simple Life
Soul Simple Innovation LLC