For anyone who has ever wondered about the mysteries that lie beyond everyday experience, or doubted the reality of the afterlife, Angels in My Hair is a moving and deeply inspirational journey into the unseen world.
For as long as she can remember, Lorna Byrne has seen angels. As a young child, she assumed everyone could see the otherworldly beings who always accompanied her. Yet in the eyes of adults, her abnormal behavior was a symptom of mental deficiency. Today, sick and troubled people from around the world are drawn to her for comfort and healing, and even theologians of different faiths seek her guidance. Lorna is trusted for her ability to communicate with spirits and angels—and by sharing her intimate knowledge of the spiritual world she offers a message of hope and love to us all.
Angels in My Hair is an engrossing chronicle of Lorna’s incredible life story. Invoking a wonderful sense of place, she describes growing up poor in Ireland, finding work in Dublin, and marrying the man of her dreams—only to have the marriage cut short by tragedy. Already a bestseller in Ireland, her story gives readers a unique insight into the angelic help that is around us and available to us all the time. As Lorna says, "All you have to do is ask."
In this uplifting autobiography, a modern-day Irish mystic shares her vivid encounters and conversations with the angels and spirits she has known her entire life.
Angels in My Hair
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Book Description
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About the Author
Lorna Byrne has been seeing and talking to angels since she was a baby. Now, having raised her family, she talks openly for the first time about what she has seen and learned. She lives quietly in rural Ireland.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter 1
Through different eyes
When I was two years old the doctor told my mother I was "retarded."
When I was a baby, my mother noticed that I always seemed to be in a world of my own. I can even remember lying in a cot--a big basket--and seeing my mother bending over me. Surrounding my mother I saw wonderful bright, shiny beings in all the colors of the rainbow; they were much bigger than I was, but smaller than her--about the size of a three-year-old child. These beings floated in the air like feathers; and I remember reaching out to touch them, but I never succeeded. I was fascinated by these creatures with their beautiful lights. At that time I didn't understand that I was seeing anything different from what other people saw; it would be much later that I learned from them that they were called angels.
As the months passed, my mother noticed that I'd always be looking or staring somewhere else, no matter what she'd do to try to get my attention. In truth, I was somewhere else: I was away with the angels, watching what they were doing and talking and playing with them. I was enthralled.
I was a late talker, but I had been conversing with angels from very early on. Sometimes we used words as you and I understand them, but sometimes no words were needed--we would know each other's thoughts. I believed that everyone else could see what I saw, but then the angels told me that I was not to say anything to anyone about seeing them, that I should keep it a secret between us. In fact, for many years I listened to the angels and I didn't tell people what I saw. It is only now in writing this book that I am for the first time telling much of what I have seen.
The doctor's comment when I was just two was to have a profound effect on my life: I realized that people can be very cruel. At the time I was born, in 1953, my parents lived in Old Kilmainham, near the center of Dublin. My father rented a little bicycle repair shop there, which had a cottage attached. If you walked through the shop and around to the left you would come to a tiny and fairly dilapidated house. It was part of a row of old cottages and shops, but most of them were empty or abandoned because they were in such bad condition. For much of the time we lived in the one little room downstairs: here we cooked, ate, talked, played, and even washed in a big metal basin in front of the fire. Although the house had no bathroom, outside in the back garden, down a little path, was a shed with a loo. Upstairs there were two small bedrooms; at first I shared one of the bedrooms, and a bed, with my older sister Emer.
It wasn't just angels I was seeing (and I saw them constantly--from the moment I woke up until I went to sleep), but also the spirits of people who had died. My brother, Christopher, had been born a year before me but he had died when he was only about ten weeks old. Although I never saw him while he was alive, I could visualize him--he was dark haired, while my sister and I were fair--and I could also play with him in spirit.
At the time I thought there was nothing strange about this; it felt as if he was just another child, although he seemed a little brighter in appearance. One of the first things that made me realize that he was different, though, was that his age could change. Sometimes he appeared as a baby, but other times he looked about the same age as me, toddling across the floor. He wasn't there constantly, either, but seemed to come and go.
Late one cold winter afternoon, just as it was getting dark, I was alone in the little living room of the house in Old Kilmainham. There was fire in the open fireplace, which was the only light in the room. The firelight flickered across the floor where I was sitting playing with little wooden building blocks that my father had made. Christopher came to play with me. He sat nearer the fire--he said that it was too hot for me where he was, but it was okay for him as he didn't feel the heat. Together we built a tower. I would put one brick down and he would put another on top of it. The tower was getting very tall and then, suddenly, our hands touched. I was amazed--he felt so different from other people I touched. When I touched him he sparked; it was as if there were little stars flying. At that moment I went into him (or perhaps he went into me); it was as if we merged and became one. In my shock I knocked over our tower of blocks!
I burst out laughing, then I touched him again. I think that was the first time I fully realized that he wasn't flesh and blood.
I never confused Christopher with an angel; the angels I saw did sometimes have a human appearance, but when they did, most of them had wings and their feet did not touch the ground and they had a sort of bright light shining inside them. Some of the time the angels I saw would have no human aspect at all, but appeared as a sharp glowing light.
Christopher appeared around my mum a lot. Sometimes Mum would be sitting in the chair by the fire and would doze off, and I'd see him cradled in her arms. I didn't know whether my mother was aware of Christopher's presence so I asked him, "Will I tell Mum that you're here?"
"No, you can't tell her," he replied. "She won't understand. But sometimes she feels me."
One winter morning the angels came to my bed as the sun was coming up. I was curled up under the blankets; my sister Emer, with whom I shared the bed, was up and about and instead Christopher was curled up beside me. He tickled me and said, "Look, look, Lorna--over at the window."
As I have said, angels can appear in different forms and sizes; this morning they looked like snowflakes! The glass in the window seemed to become a vapor, and as each snowflake hit the window it was transformed into an angel about the size of a baby. The angels were then carried on a beam of sunlight through the window, and each one seemed to be covered in white and shiny snowflakes. As the angels touched me the snowflakes fell from them onto me; they tickled as they landed and, surprisingly, they felt warm, not cold.
"Wouldn't it be wonderful," Christopher said, "if everybody knew that they could fill their pockets with angels; that they could fit thousands of angels into one pocket, just like with snowflakes, and could carry them around with them and never be alone."
I turned and asked, "What if they melted in their pockets?"
Christopher giggled and said, "No! Angels never melt!"
I rather sadly replied, "Christopher, I wish that you could fit in my mum's pocket like a snowflake, and be there for her all the time."
He turned and looked at me, as we were cuddled up in bed, and said, "You know I'm there already."
When I was an adult my mother told me she had had a baby son called Christopher who had been born a year before me but had only lived ten weeks. I just smiled in response. I remember asking her where Christopher was buried, and she told me that it was in an unmarked grave (as was the custom in those days) in a baby's graveyard in Dublin.
It's sad that there is no grave with his name on it that I can go and visit, but he's not forgotten. Sometimes even now, all these years later, I feel Christopher's hand in my pocket pretending to make snowflakes, reminding me I am never alone.
I learned more about Christopher and my mother one day when I was about four or five years old. I was sitting at the table swinging my legs and eating breakfast when I caught a glimpse of Christopher looking as if he were about twelve years old, running across the room to the shop door just as my mother walked in with some toast. She had a big smile on her face as she said, "Lorna, there is a surprise for you in the back workroom under Da's workbench!"
I jumped up from the table, all excited, and followed Christopher. He went straight through the shop and into the dark workshop; I had to stop at the door because it was so dark in there that I couldn't see anything and I needed my eyes to adjust to the darkness. However, Christopher was just like a light, a soft shimmering glow that lit up a path for me through the cluttered workshop. He called out, "The cat has had kittens!" And there, thanks to Christopher's light, I could see four tiny little kittens--three were _jet-_black, and one was black and white. They were so beautiful, so soft and glossy. The mother cat, Blackie, got out of the box, stretched herself, then jumped out of the little window into the garden. I ran after her and called to Christopher to come too, but he would not come into the garden.
I walked back in and asked Christopher, "Why wouldn't you come outside?"
He took my hand, as if to comfort me--I loved the touch of his hand--and our hands merged again. It felt magical; it made me feel safe and happy.
"Lorna, when babies die their spirits stay with their mothers for as long as they are needed, so I stay here with Mum. If I went outside it would be like breaking those memories--and that I won't do!"
Even at that young age, I knew what he meant. My mother had poured so much love into him: all the memories she had of being pregnant and carrying him inside her, the birth, the joy and the happiness she had holding him in her arms and bringing him home--when even then she had a feeling that something was wrong, despite what the doctors told her. Mum had a precious few weeks at home with Christopher before he died, and Christopher told me of all the love that she had poured on him, and he now poured that love on her.
So my spirit brother would remain in the house, never going out, until the day came when it seemed that my mum felt strong enough to move on and was ready to let my little brother go. That day was the day when we had to leave that little shop in Old Kilmainham for good.
When I see an angel I want to stop and stare; I feel like I am in the presence of a tremendous power. When I was y...
Through different eyes
When I was two years old the doctor told my mother I was "retarded."
When I was a baby, my mother noticed that I always seemed to be in a world of my own. I can even remember lying in a cot--a big basket--and seeing my mother bending over me. Surrounding my mother I saw wonderful bright, shiny beings in all the colors of the rainbow; they were much bigger than I was, but smaller than her--about the size of a three-year-old child. These beings floated in the air like feathers; and I remember reaching out to touch them, but I never succeeded. I was fascinated by these creatures with their beautiful lights. At that time I didn't understand that I was seeing anything different from what other people saw; it would be much later that I learned from them that they were called angels.
As the months passed, my mother noticed that I'd always be looking or staring somewhere else, no matter what she'd do to try to get my attention. In truth, I was somewhere else: I was away with the angels, watching what they were doing and talking and playing with them. I was enthralled.
I was a late talker, but I had been conversing with angels from very early on. Sometimes we used words as you and I understand them, but sometimes no words were needed--we would know each other's thoughts. I believed that everyone else could see what I saw, but then the angels told me that I was not to say anything to anyone about seeing them, that I should keep it a secret between us. In fact, for many years I listened to the angels and I didn't tell people what I saw. It is only now in writing this book that I am for the first time telling much of what I have seen.
The doctor's comment when I was just two was to have a profound effect on my life: I realized that people can be very cruel. At the time I was born, in 1953, my parents lived in Old Kilmainham, near the center of Dublin. My father rented a little bicycle repair shop there, which had a cottage attached. If you walked through the shop and around to the left you would come to a tiny and fairly dilapidated house. It was part of a row of old cottages and shops, but most of them were empty or abandoned because they were in such bad condition. For much of the time we lived in the one little room downstairs: here we cooked, ate, talked, played, and even washed in a big metal basin in front of the fire. Although the house had no bathroom, outside in the back garden, down a little path, was a shed with a loo. Upstairs there were two small bedrooms; at first I shared one of the bedrooms, and a bed, with my older sister Emer.
It wasn't just angels I was seeing (and I saw them constantly--from the moment I woke up until I went to sleep), but also the spirits of people who had died. My brother, Christopher, had been born a year before me but he had died when he was only about ten weeks old. Although I never saw him while he was alive, I could visualize him--he was dark haired, while my sister and I were fair--and I could also play with him in spirit.
At the time I thought there was nothing strange about this; it felt as if he was just another child, although he seemed a little brighter in appearance. One of the first things that made me realize that he was different, though, was that his age could change. Sometimes he appeared as a baby, but other times he looked about the same age as me, toddling across the floor. He wasn't there constantly, either, but seemed to come and go.
Late one cold winter afternoon, just as it was getting dark, I was alone in the little living room of the house in Old Kilmainham. There was fire in the open fireplace, which was the only light in the room. The firelight flickered across the floor where I was sitting playing with little wooden building blocks that my father had made. Christopher came to play with me. He sat nearer the fire--he said that it was too hot for me where he was, but it was okay for him as he didn't feel the heat. Together we built a tower. I would put one brick down and he would put another on top of it. The tower was getting very tall and then, suddenly, our hands touched. I was amazed--he felt so different from other people I touched. When I touched him he sparked; it was as if there were little stars flying. At that moment I went into him (or perhaps he went into me); it was as if we merged and became one. In my shock I knocked over our tower of blocks!
I burst out laughing, then I touched him again. I think that was the first time I fully realized that he wasn't flesh and blood.
I never confused Christopher with an angel; the angels I saw did sometimes have a human appearance, but when they did, most of them had wings and their feet did not touch the ground and they had a sort of bright light shining inside them. Some of the time the angels I saw would have no human aspect at all, but appeared as a sharp glowing light.
Christopher appeared around my mum a lot. Sometimes Mum would be sitting in the chair by the fire and would doze off, and I'd see him cradled in her arms. I didn't know whether my mother was aware of Christopher's presence so I asked him, "Will I tell Mum that you're here?"
"No, you can't tell her," he replied. "She won't understand. But sometimes she feels me."
One winter morning the angels came to my bed as the sun was coming up. I was curled up under the blankets; my sister Emer, with whom I shared the bed, was up and about and instead Christopher was curled up beside me. He tickled me and said, "Look, look, Lorna--over at the window."
As I have said, angels can appear in different forms and sizes; this morning they looked like snowflakes! The glass in the window seemed to become a vapor, and as each snowflake hit the window it was transformed into an angel about the size of a baby. The angels were then carried on a beam of sunlight through the window, and each one seemed to be covered in white and shiny snowflakes. As the angels touched me the snowflakes fell from them onto me; they tickled as they landed and, surprisingly, they felt warm, not cold.
"Wouldn't it be wonderful," Christopher said, "if everybody knew that they could fill their pockets with angels; that they could fit thousands of angels into one pocket, just like with snowflakes, and could carry them around with them and never be alone."
I turned and asked, "What if they melted in their pockets?"
Christopher giggled and said, "No! Angels never melt!"
I rather sadly replied, "Christopher, I wish that you could fit in my mum's pocket like a snowflake, and be there for her all the time."
He turned and looked at me, as we were cuddled up in bed, and said, "You know I'm there already."
When I was an adult my mother told me she had had a baby son called Christopher who had been born a year before me but had only lived ten weeks. I just smiled in response. I remember asking her where Christopher was buried, and she told me that it was in an unmarked grave (as was the custom in those days) in a baby's graveyard in Dublin.
It's sad that there is no grave with his name on it that I can go and visit, but he's not forgotten. Sometimes even now, all these years later, I feel Christopher's hand in my pocket pretending to make snowflakes, reminding me I am never alone.
I learned more about Christopher and my mother one day when I was about four or five years old. I was sitting at the table swinging my legs and eating breakfast when I caught a glimpse of Christopher looking as if he were about twelve years old, running across the room to the shop door just as my mother walked in with some toast. She had a big smile on her face as she said, "Lorna, there is a surprise for you in the back workroom under Da's workbench!"
I jumped up from the table, all excited, and followed Christopher. He went straight through the shop and into the dark workshop; I had to stop at the door because it was so dark in there that I couldn't see anything and I needed my eyes to adjust to the darkness. However, Christopher was just like a light, a soft shimmering glow that lit up a path for me through the cluttered workshop. He called out, "The cat has had kittens!" And there, thanks to Christopher's light, I could see four tiny little kittens--three were _jet-_black, and one was black and white. They were so beautiful, so soft and glossy. The mother cat, Blackie, got out of the box, stretched herself, then jumped out of the little window into the garden. I ran after her and called to Christopher to come too, but he would not come into the garden.
I walked back in and asked Christopher, "Why wouldn't you come outside?"
He took my hand, as if to comfort me--I loved the touch of his hand--and our hands merged again. It felt magical; it made me feel safe and happy.
"Lorna, when babies die their spirits stay with their mothers for as long as they are needed, so I stay here with Mum. If I went outside it would be like breaking those memories--and that I won't do!"
Even at that young age, I knew what he meant. My mother had poured so much love into him: all the memories she had of being pregnant and carrying him inside her, the birth, the joy and the happiness she had holding him in her arms and bringing him home--when even then she had a feeling that something was wrong, despite what the doctors told her. Mum had a precious few weeks at home with Christopher before he died, and Christopher told me of all the love that she had poured on him, and he now poured that love on her.
So my spirit brother would remain in the house, never going out, until the day came when it seemed that my mum felt strong enough to move on and was ready to let my little brother go. That day was the day when we had to leave that little shop in Old Kilmainham for good.
When I see an angel I want to stop and stare; I feel like I am in the presence of a tremendous power. When I was y...
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62 of 67 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
One angel author to another...,
By Joan Wester Anderson "Joan" (Chicago area) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Angels in My Hair (Hardcover)
Since the first wave of angel interest swept through our country in the early `90's, an estimated 250 books about them have been published. Some have concentrated on the spiritual aspects of angels, while others feature communicating with one's angel or angels in certain historical periods. Not every publication fits what the Bible teaches us about these heavenly beings, so it's important to use discernment when choosing what to read.
A few weeks ago, I was asked by Doubleday Publishers to review the newest of the angel books, titled "Angels in My Hair," by Lorna Byrne, a mystic who lives near Dublin, Ireland, and was coming to the United States to do a book tour. When I heard that the book is already a bestseller in the United Kingdom and will eventually be available in over 40 countries, I couldn't turn down the request. And I'm so glad I had the pleasure of both the book and a lovely conversation with Lorna herself. Once again it proves my own belief that angels are involved on earth in many areas today, and with many different people. Lorna was born into a poverty-stricken Irish family, and when she was two years old, her parents decided that she was mentally retarded, and would not benefit from formal education. Actually, Lorna was "different," but her apparent inattention was caused by her ability to see angels all around her, almost all the time. Like any young child, she originally assumed that everyone was able to see into this glorious world, but as she grew, she realized that this gift was hers alone, and it would be best if she kept it a secret. From this point on, she grew somewhat distant from the people around her, seeking only to obey the beautiful beings who had taken over her world. When Lorna reached early adolescence, she left school and went to work doing odd jobs for her father who ran an automobile garage. It was about that time when the angels laid out her future:: she would marry a man she loved very much and they would have children. But poverty would be the family's constant companion, her beloved husband Joe would die far too soon, and Lorna would be called upon to use her developing gifts of healing, knowledge and hope for people whom God would send to her. It all seemed far too disturbing for Lorna but, as always, she said "yes" to God, assuming He would guide her, through her angels, to the path He had chosen for her. The rest of this well-written volume outlines the difficulties she encountered (some extremely hard), her beautiful children who ended up encouraging her to come out of her self-imposed isolation and tell the world her story, and her plans to write additional books to help people understand how important angels are.. "Whether you believe it or not, you have your own angel," Lorna tells each of us. "He was assigned to you before you were even conceived, and he will be there to help you pass over." This does not mean life is perfect---we still must go through our human lives, she explains, but angels are intended to be our companions and guards, especially during the hardships that come to all of us. The book is a blessing. Read it and rejoice!
28 of 32 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Lorna's Angels,
By
This review is from: Angels in My Hair (Hardcover)
If you have ever wished that there were more to life than meets the eye, this is the book for you.
It is the autobiography of an Irish woman who since her earliest moments of awareness has lived in two worlds. To her parents, her teachers and her classmates, she seemed distracted, preoccupied, perhaps even retarded. And yet today as a mature woman, a widow and a mother of four, she offers a miraculous perspective on life that challenges most of what we assume to be true--or, for that matter, possible . To read this book is to enter a sacred space. We leave our contemporary world of swirling, dizzying uncertainties and find a still point of clarity and certainty: angels exist, we matter to them and to God, and they will guide us if we can quiet the noise in our lives and listen for their whispered counsel. It may come as a feeling, a hunch,a surprising coincidence or even an unaccustomed train of thought. Once we start to take it seriously, everything will change. This does not mean, however, that all of our problems will suddenly vanish. What will change is how we view them and deal with them. Life in this world is challenging and full of mystery, as the author's account of her own life attests. Angels exist to guide us, to inspire us, and also to console us. But we are free spiritual beings and must choose to listen. Consider this: Most of what is wrong with life on our planet is a result of the actions people take, as groups and as individuals. It is true that there are natural disasters from time to time, but if we all listened to our better angels and overcame our fears and hatreds, we could lessen the suffering of others through our caring and support. The greatest threat to humanity is, and always has been, our capacity for inhumanity and indifference to our fellow beings. Lorna Byrne reminds us that each human soul is a luminous divine creation worthy of love. It is true that we have heard these things before. Yet this account is different. Perhaps It is the author's distinctive voice and presence that make this book so compelling. We sense an innocence and purity in her that is like that of a young child who has not yet known the disappointments and sorrows of life. And yet we know she has--and has transcended them. Some European interviewers have expressed the opinion that this book is not a literary masterpiece; the language is so simple that it can be read by a sixth-grader. This criticism misses the point. Some writers are masters of language who dazzle their readers with linguistic and literary virtuosity. But there are others who convey a profound experience in the simplest terms, shaping the narrative of their story so that its essence shines through their words as sunlight passes through a window. Lorna Byrne is this kind of writer. The very simplicity of her language renders many passages as evocative as poetry. We must remember, though, that this is not a novel. It is a an account of her lived experiences. A friend of mine who read a chapter of the Irish edition earlier this year remarked at the time that the author either has a beautiful imagination or really does see angels. After reading the complete American edition, he recently declared: "She really does see angels." See if you don't agree. For those who would like to explore some of the issues raised by Lorna Byrne's experiences, I would recommend a book published last year in the U.S. by her editor at Random House Century-- U.K. The Secret History of the World by Mark Booth is an imaginative masterpiece that examines the Western esoteric tradition in the form of a thought experiment and asks how great minds in past ages could view the world in a way that departs so strikingly from the mainstream. The endnotes are also worth reading, especially those that relate to Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925), a spiritual and intellectual Titan whom many Europeans regard as the greatest and most creative thinker of the 19th and 20th centuries. Ronald M. Mazur Winona State University
15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A rare find in faith and inspiration,
By
This review is from: Angels in My Hair (Hardcover)
This book has been inspirational in keeping faith alive. Ms. Byrne's story is heartwrenching and yet uplifting. She was very misunderstood as a child and apparently has a much closer relationship with the spiritual world than most. It helps in knowing that God and our angels hear our prayers without having to even say them. Not all we expect from life is smooth and easy, but if lead by our angels we will come to be enlighted much as Ms. Byrne has been able all of her life. I eagerly await her next book. Luckily I have connections in Ireland. And I wish to thank Ms. Byrne and her angels the only way I know how, for listening to her angels, writing this story and more recently at a book signing listening about my daughter's story in which she was critically injured and lost her best friend. Her family are all from Ireland and provided us with this book as a spiritual way of remembering Niamh, and having seen white feathers firsthand gives us comfort.
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