Maria Shriver says it was ‘scary’ to release her 1st poetry book. Here’s why she did it

Arts & Culture, Books

The photo on the cover of Maria Shriver’s first poetry collection has a special meaning.The TODAY contributor shares why she chose a childhood photo of herself with her beloved pony, Miss Buck, as the cover image for her new book, “I Am Maria,” in an interview with TODAY.com.”That horse was my best friend, my everything. There’s a poem in there about her, and she was my home, and so I wanted to put her on there because she’s the first person that didn’t ask me my name,” Shriver says. “She showed me unconditional love.”Themes of longing, loneliness and the power of love — romantic, familial and self-love — are constant throughout Shriver’s poetry collection, which begins with an introduction explaining how poetry became a part of her journey of self-exploration, and how her past connects with how she feels about herself now.The former first lady of California wrote that she started writing poetry to help find herself after the loss of her mother and father, and to help heal from her divorce from her ex-husband, Arnold Schwarzenegger, to whom she was married for over 30 years.”I Am Maria” is Maria Shriver’s first poetry collection.TODAYShriver says she would meet up with friends who would ask what she was up to, and she would tell them she was writing poems. When they asked to read one, she would share them. A few of her friends suggested she release them, to which she always replied, “No way, no way,” she says, until she started hearing more stories like what she had experienced in her life.”We all have this universal longing to feel at home. We all have this universal desire to be at home in our lives, to be at home with ourselves, to feel seen, to feel loved, to feel accepted, and that’s what this book is about,” she says.”It’s about looking at one’s life — you have to go back so you can go forward,” she continues. “It’s about addressing those things, not being afraid of them, and incorporating them into your life, so that you can feel seen, feel accepted, first and foremost, by yourself.”Shriver compares the feeling of needing someone to like, see or accept you for who you are as being on a “hamster wheel forever.””If you see yourself, if you love yourself, if you accept yourself, if you forgive yourself, if you are living in your truth, then your life will take a very different turn,” Shriver says.Even though Shriver has released seven other books, she says she was nervous to release all of her poems because of their vulnerability.”I think they’re powerful, but I think they’re vulnerable,” she says. “And so I think when you put your heart and your vulnerability out into the public square, it’s scary, right? Because you run the risk of it being trampled on, you run the risk of your heart being made fun of, you run the risk of your heart being rejected … but the greater risk was being afraid to do that.”Shriver says she has always tried to live her life so that she’s not afraid to do the things she has set her mind to.”I was terrified to anchor for the first time. I was terrified to go on air. I was terrified to do the big interview. I was terrified to get married, to become a mother. I was terrified to get divorced, all of these things,” she says.”There are milestones in life, when you lose a parent, when you lose a beloved animal, they’re all things that we often think we can’t get through, we can’t survive,” she continues. “Therefore we stuff them down and don’t really deal with it, and that has its own challenges.”Shriver says she tries to lead a life where she looks back and doesn’t have any regrets, and that releasing the book was a way to feel her emotions and challenge herself to do something new. “It was one of those things that, in many ways, I got out of my head to write these, to write the whole book, and it’s a good thing for me to get out of my head,” Shriver says.A group of poems she thought about not including in “I Am Maria” are poems she wrote to each of her four children in honor of their 18th birthdays.”I went back and forth on (including them),” she says. “I took it out, I put it back in. I thought, well, they are what has given me sustenance. They are what made me want to move my life forward. They give me life. And so to exclude them from who I am means excluding a big part of my life, because they are the biggest part of my life.””They are the biggest part of my life,” Maria Shriver says of her children.Jeff Kravitz / FilmMagic She shares she wrote the poems for her kids Katherine, Christina, Patrick and Christopher because she wanted them to see who she saw, and so that they could have her visions of themselves at 18 forever.“It was something I wished, you know, ‘Wow, I wonder what my mother thought of being 18,'” she says. “What was that like? Who was I to her? So I wanted them to have that. This is a book, really, about looking at my life, the good, the bad, the wonderful, and they are my life.”Shriver says her eldest daughter, Katherine, has read her new book, but she isn’t sure about the others.”I haven’t really gotten a verdict from the other ones,” she says with a laugh. “I’m lucky I’m not really waiting for anybody’s verdict. In the past, I’ve always waited, every other book — I’ve written seven books — I’ve waited for my mother’s approval, or someone else’s.””With this one, I feel very at peace with it, and I’m not tracking it, waiting for someone to accept it, because I find myself at a very different place in my life,” she adds.Shriver says she hopes readers will learn there is an artist in every person, whether they think they are creative or not. She describes her career as a journalist and working with facts to her new journey as as poet.”This is a whole other path, right? I think we’re all here to have as many paths as we can get through,” she says.

Maria Shriver says it was ‘scary’ to release her 1st poetry book. Here’s why she did it

Arts & Culture, Books

The photo on the cover of Maria Shriver’s first poetry collection has a special meaning.The TODAY contributor shares why she chose a childhood photo of herself with her beloved pony, Miss Buck, as the cover image for her new book, “I Am Maria,” in an interview with TODAY.com.”That horse was my best friend, my everything. There’s a poem in there about her, and she was my home, and so I wanted to put her on there because she’s the first person that didn’t ask me my name,” Shriver says. “She showed me unconditional love.”Themes of longing, loneliness and the power of love — romantic, familial and self-love — are constant throughout Shriver’s poetry collection, which begins with an introduction explaining how poetry became a part of her journey of self-exploration, and how her past connects with how she feels about herself now.The former first lady of California wrote that she started writing poetry to help find herself after the loss of her mother and father, and to help heal from her divorce from her ex-husband, Arnold Schwarzenegger, to whom she was married for over 30 years.”I Am Maria” is Maria Shriver’s first poetry collection.TODAYShriver says she would meet up with friends who would ask what she was up to, and she would tell them she was writing poems. When they asked to read one, she would share them. A few of her friends suggested she release them, to which she always replied, “No way, no way,” she says, until she started hearing more stories like what she had experienced in her life.”We all have this universal longing to feel at home. We all have this universal desire to be at home in our lives, to be at home with ourselves, to feel seen, to feel loved, to feel accepted, and that’s what this book is about,” she says.”It’s about looking at one’s life — you have to go back so you can go forward,” she continues. “It’s about addressing those things, not being afraid of them, and incorporating them into your life, so that you can feel seen, feel accepted, first and foremost, by yourself.”Shriver compares the feeling of needing someone to like, see or accept you for who you are as being on a “hamster wheel forever.””If you see yourself, if you love yourself, if you accept yourself, if you forgive yourself, if you are living in your truth, then your life will take a very different turn,” Shriver says.Even though Shriver has released seven other books, she says she was nervous to release all of her poems because of their vulnerability.”I think they’re powerful, but I think they’re vulnerable,” she says. “And so I think when you put your heart and your vulnerability out into the public square, it’s scary, right? Because you run the risk of it being trampled on, you run the risk of your heart being made fun of, you run the risk of your heart being rejected … but the greater risk was being afraid to do that.”Shriver says she has always tried to live her life so that she’s not afraid to do the things she has set her mind to.”I was terrified to anchor for the first time. I was terrified to go on air. I was terrified to do the big interview. I was terrified to get married, to become a mother. I was terrified to get divorced, all of these things,” she says.”There are milestones in life, when you lose a parent, when you lose a beloved animal, they’re all things that we often think we can’t get through, we can’t survive,” she continues. “Therefore we stuff them down and don’t really deal with it, and that has its own challenges.”Shriver says she tries to lead a life where she looks back and doesn’t have any regrets, and that releasing the book was a way to feel her emotions and challenge herself to do something new. “It was one of those things that, in many ways, I got out of my head to write these, to write the whole book, and it’s a good thing for me to get out of my head,” Shriver says.A group of poems she thought about not including in “I Am Maria” are poems she wrote to each of her four children in honor of their 18th birthdays.”I went back and forth on (including them),” she says. “I took it out, I put it back in. I thought, well, they are what has given me sustenance. They are what made me want to move my life forward. They give me life. And so to exclude them from who I am means excluding a big part of my life, because they are the biggest part of my life.””They are the biggest part of my life,” Maria Shriver says of her children.Jeff Kravitz / FilmMagic She shares she wrote the poems for her kids Katherine, Christina, Patrick and Christopher because she wanted them to see who she saw, and so that they could have her visions of themselves at 18 forever.“It was something I wished, you know, ‘Wow, I wonder what my mother thought of being 18,'” she says. “What was that like? Who was I to her? So I wanted them to have that. This is a book, really, about looking at my life, the good, the bad, the wonderful, and they are my life.”Shriver says her eldest daughter, Katherine, has read her new book, but she isn’t sure about the others.”I haven’t really gotten a verdict from the other ones,” she says with a laugh. “I’m lucky I’m not really waiting for anybody’s verdict. In the past, I’ve always waited, every other book — I’ve written seven books — I’ve waited for my mother’s approval, or someone else’s.””With this one, I feel very at peace with it, and I’m not tracking it, waiting for someone to accept it, because I find myself at a very different place in my life,” she adds.Shriver says she hopes readers will learn there is an artist in every person, whether they think they are creative or not. She describes her career as a journalist and working with facts to her new journey as as poet.”This is a whole other path, right? I think we’re all here to have as many paths as we can get through,” she says.

Examining the Legacy of Baruch Spinoza in the History of Science

Science and Health

Image: Baruch Spinoza, via Wikimedia Commons.
On a classic episode of ID the Future, join host and geologist Casey Luskin and historian of science Michael Keas for a lively conversation puncturing a series of anti-Christian myths about the history of science, including the Dark Ages myth, the flat-earth myth, the myth that humanity was rendered insignificant by the discovery of the size of the universe, and the simplistic revisionist history of Galileo and the Inquisition. What about the claim in the Cosmos TV series reboot that in abandoning his traditional Jewish faith, 17th-century philosopher Baruch Spinoza was able to provide an improved framework for doing science? As Keas argues, the truth is just the opposite. Spinoza, he says, abandoned a key tenet of Judeo-Christian theology that had proven vital to the birth of science. Download the podcast or listen to it here.

Dig Deeper

‘Consecrate the heavens’: Catholic NASA scientist seeks to place cross on the moon

Science and Health

CV NEWS FEED // By the end of the decade, a cross may stand on the surface of the moon — a bold effort to unite advanced space engineering with a public act of Christian witness.

Led by Catholic entrepreneur and NASA scientist Justin Park, the Cross on the Moon Coalition’s HOPE-1 project aims to send a physical symbol of faith beyond Earth’s atmosphere as a public witness to Christ and a reminder that “God is the center of the universe.”

Park told CatholicVote that the MoonCross is rich in symbolism, noting its role as a sacred consecration and a cultural message. 

“It is a sacrifice to God. It is a testament to the power of faith,” he said. “It stands for peace and unity. It is a monument from God that radiates his mercy and love.” 

Park’s vision for MoonCross emerged through personal grief and a moment of spiritual clarity. Having lost his mother at a very young age, he struggled to make sense of her suffering and the family’s seemingly unanswered prayers for her healing. Years later, she visited him in a dream, appearing as an angel and helping him come to terms with her passing and recognize his calling to become an evangelist for Christ.

“My mother helped me reconcile with God,” Park said. “We don’t always know why The Lord does what he does, but now I have a mission.”    

He believes his calling goes beyond our planet.

“Faith has no boundaries,” Park said, “and God has destined us for greater things.”

Park emphasized the extreme standards required for any object headed to the moon.

“We need to use the lightest metal composites possible because every pound is literally a million dollars,” he said. “Anything you send to that Moon must go through a stringent process of acoustic vibrations testing, vacuum chamber testing, and thermal threshold testing.”

To further refine the design, Park said the team is planning a university design competition to improve on the current model.  

Catholics and all Christians have been very supportive of the project because they “understand what the cross means,” according to Park.

“The space community is less supportive, especially those who don’t understand or appreciate Christ’s sacrifice for our sins,” he said.

The project hasn’t been without its critics, and some are wary of mixing religion with space. But Park says this has only strengthened his resolve.

“I believe religion and space exploration go hand in hand because they are both searching for the truth,” he said.

Still, Park believes the MoonCross is already sparking important conversations — especially around culture, theology, and unity.

“Living in Washington, D.C., I’ve had many conversations with people from around the world about what this mission means,” he said. “The real uncertainty is less about faith and science clashing, and more about the theology of what we are doing.”

When it comes to criticism, Park said he responds based on where each person is coming from.

“Do they believe in God? If not, I highlight how important religion has been to the history of human culture,” he said. “If they don’t like space, too bad, space exploration is happening. If they don’t understand how this helps people, I get them to acknowledge that this feeds people spiritually and gives us hope, which is what the world needs more now than ever.”

When asked what he hopes the cross will communicate when it stands on the moon, Park responded simply: “God’s love for the planet.” 

But he also sees it as a call to action. 

“I hope that Christ’s message of peace, love, and fellowship will touch people in their hearts and compel them to donate to the Coalition,” he said. “That way, they can be a part of history and do something greater than themselves.”

He hopes this mission will inspire not just spiritual reflection but also renewed care for one another — and for the planet.

“We strive to inspire humanity by building this Jesus-focused community that envisions a brighter future, in space,” Park said. “People will hopefully be encouraged by this endeavor to be better stewards of the planet, or, at least treat their fellow man with dignity.”

While some look to space exploration primarily as a way to move naturally destructive activities like mining off the earth, Park has a different vision. 

“I see this as a chance to elevate humanity to new heights,” he said, “and spread the gospel of the Lord throughout the solar system, starting with the Moon.”