Choquette, Sonia (Loraine) 1957–

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Choquette, Sonia (Loraine) 1957–

PERSONAL: Born October 8, 1957, in Denver, CO; daughter of Albert Paul and Sonia Polixenia (Apostu) Choquette; married Patrick Alan Tully, June 30, 1984; children: Sonia Soraya, Sabrina Isabel. Education: Attended University of Denver, 1976–78; attended University of Paris, Sorbonne, 1979–81; American Institute of Holistic Theology, Ph.D., 1998.

ADDRESSES: Home—Chicago, IL. Office—Inner Wisdom, P.O. Box 408996, Chicago, IL 60640-8996. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: Writer and lecturer on psychic and healing issues; psychic counselor in private practice. Visiting lecturer, New York Open Center, 1996, 1997, 1998; Learning Exchange, Washington, DC, 1996; and Learning Annex, California, 1996, 1997. Featured guest on television shows.

WRITINGS:

The Psychic Pathway: A Workbook for Reawakening the Voice of Your Soul, Carol Trade Paperbacks (New York, NY), 1995.

Your Heart's Desire: Instructions for Creating the Life You Really Want, Three Rivers Press (New York, NY), 1997.

The Wise Child: A Spiritual Guide to Nurturing Your Child's Intuition, Three Rivers Press (New York, NY), 1999.

True Balance: A Commonsense Guide for Renewing Your Spirit, Three Rivers Press (New York, NY), 2000.

Your Psychic Pathway to Joy: A Simple Guide for Living Lightly, Clarkson Potter (New York, NY), 2002.

Your Psychic Pathway to New Beginnings: A Simple Guide to Great Adventures, Clarkson Potter (New York, NY), 2002.

Diary of a Psychic: Shattering the Myths, Hay House (Carlsbad, CA), 2003.

Trust Your Vibes: Secret Tools for Six-sensory Living, Hay House (Carlsbad, CA), 2004.

Vitamins for the Soul: Daily Doses of Wisdom for Personal Empowerment, Hay House (Carlsbad, CA), 2005.

Also creator of Trust Your Vibes Oracle Cards. Contributor to periodicals, including Mothering.

SIDELIGHTS: Through her books and lectures, Sonia Choquette gives spiritual guidance based on the human ability to read and judge instincts and intuitions, abilities that in a more highly developed form are thought of as psychic abilities. Choquette maintains that all people have psychic abilities, but that U.S. culture encourages rationalizing and thinking through problems rather than "feeling" one's way through them. Her books offer practical advice on how to achieve a harmonious life through articulation of "gut feelings" and through tapping inner resources to analyze day-to-day problems. A Publishers Weekly reviewer of Choquette's Your Heart's Desire: Instructions for Creating the Life You Really Want noted that the author's works "should serve many as a useful primer to finding the spiritual within the material or ordinary life.

From a very early age Choquette was encouraged to explore her psychic resources. By the time she was a teenager, she was giving readings—even though sometimes she lacked the maturity to understand the advice she imparted. She has encouraged her own children to follow their intuition as well, describing her parenting ideas in The Wise Child: A Spiritual Guide to Nurturing Your Child's Intuition. In Mothering magazine, Choquette explained how she helped her daughters develop a "language of spirit" that includes such code words as "vibes," "ick attack," and "grounded." The author concluded: "Giving children a way to identify and express their intuitive experiences will help them integrate these experiences more comfortably into their own lives. It is just so much easier for children to pay attention and respond to intuition if they don't have to explain what they feel or, worse, why. If they learn to just feel it, report it, and have their feelings respected, they will communicate."

In a Booklist review of Your Heart's Desire, Ilene Cooper maintained that, although many books on New Age philosophy exist, Choquette ranks "high on the list" for practical inspiration. In Booklist review of Trust Your Vibes: Secret Tools for Six-sensory Living, Cooper commended Choquette for "integrating common sense with mysticism."

On her Web site, Choquette noted: "I am psychically and creatively empowered because I was encouraged at all times to be awake, aware and guided by my highest potential, my sixth sense, the most direct link to the Divine. I grew up in an environment that recognized psychic awareness not only as natural but essential to successful navigation and creation in life…. It is a gift of higher awareness that we all have, that we can all experience, that we can all trust and that we all need!"

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, March 1, 1997, Ilene Cooper, review of Your Heart's Desire: Instructions for Creating the Life You Really Want, p. 1071; August, 2003, Ilene Cooper, review of Diary of a Psychic: Shattering the Myths, p. 1930; May 15, 2004, Ilene Cooper, review of Trust Your Vibes: Secret Tools for Six-sensory Learning, p. 1581.

Mothering, March-April, 2001, Sonia Choquette, "The Language of Spirit," p. 78.

Publishers Weekly, February 3, 1997, review of Your Heart's Desire, p. 87.