This book is about my gradual emergence from hiding my ""light""--my gifts and talents--and about discovering as I let it shine that the light in me was a gift of divine life and light that illuminates my path and can illuminate others' paths, too, and can encourage them to let their light shine. I became more alive and creative, and I continue to understand more fully the statement in the Gospel of John that ""the light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it"" (1:5). I hope that this book reminds readers of those persons and experiences in their own lives that drew them toward the light both outside and inside themselves and that helps them be more alive.