In today’s intimate and powerful conversation, I sit down with Sherri Mandell—an award-winning author, spiritual teacher, and guide through the sacred realms of writing. Known for her deeply moving memoir The Blessing of a Broken Heart and her soulful instructional work The Kabbalah of Writing, Sherri brings an entirely new lens to what writing can be: a mystical process of healing, integration, and spiritual revelation.
“Pain is power. It can be used to hurt, or it can be used to create.”
“Writing isn’t about perfection—it’s about truth. And the more personal your truth, the more universal it becomes.”
Writing is not merely a creative act—it is a sacred tool for self-healing and divine revelation.
Kabbalah offers a powerful structure for writing, helping align the writer’s inner world with mythic, archetypal patterns.
Tragedy can become a story of compassion and service when it’s framed within the sacred; the narrative we choose changes our soul’s trajectory.
Your critic has value, but it must be acknowledged and dismissed at the right time—not during the sacred act of the first draft.
Memoir becomes transformational when the self is mythologized—when the “I” becomes a character others can relate to and grow through.
Rejection is not a failure; it is part of the journey toward victory (Netzach) and a test of endurance and sacred devotion.
Writing allows us to re-enter the “Holy of Holies” of our own being, not once a year, but every day.
“Kabbalah teaches us to receive—and in writing, we receive ourselves.”
“Your voice isn’t found. It is revealed through the journey of your writing.”
She begins by offering advice for every writer—emphasize what you’re good at. Even if what you’re good at is a weakness, dramatize it. Make your voice larger than life. Writing isn’t about being average. It’s about becoming a character others can connect to.
Sherri, who has immersed herself in over 20 years of Kabbalistic study, bridges spiritual insight with the craft of writing. What begins as a discussion on Kabbalah quickly expands into a sacred unveiling of personal truth. Her journey is marked by the tragic murder of her son Koby, an event that shattered her world—and ultimately opened a divine doorway through writing.
Instead of allowing pain to destroy her, Sherri chose to create. With her family, she gave tzedakah (charity) to 14 beggars on Koby’s birthday, channeling grief into kindness. These stories became her first writings after his death, and writing became a will to live. She explains how Kabbalah’s highest sephira—Keter, the crown—represents will, not willpower, but the kind of love a mother has for her child. Writing, she explains, isn’t driven by discipline alone. It is love manifest through the act of creation.
Through writing, she encountered mystical signs—birds falling from the sky, dream visitations—and as she studied Kabbalah, these images took on meaning. In Jewish mysticism, the Messiah waits in a celestial bird’s nest. Sherri recognized she was now a part of something larger. When we write, we reframe the story, transforming tragedy into myth, pain into power.
She speaks beautifully about how writing engages the subconscious. “We’re not just writing what we know; we’re writing to discover what we know.” And writing allows you to meet yourself at every level. It becomes a space of exploration, a cave that becomes a bird’s nest. Trauma becomes revelation.
A powerful concept Sherri shares is that of “accidental angels”—life’s strange events that seem random until seen from a deeper symbolic perspective. Writing is what enables us to find those symbols. It’s not about imagination in the fantastical sense. It’s about reclaiming the imaginal dimension—the ability to transform experience through symbol and structure.
We talk about the self-critic, and Sherri suggests writing directly to that internal critic to give it a voice—and then lovingly set it aside. “You’re valuable in your own way, but now’s not your time.”
The Kabbalistic Tree of Life becomes a metaphor for the writer’s journey:
Keter (Will) inspires the act.
Chokhmah (Inspiration) floods us with ideas.
Binah (Understanding) lets us see patterns, form, and structure.
Chesed and Gevurah (Kindness and Boundaries) balance generosity and discipline.
Tiferet (Beauty) brings balance and authenticity.
Hod (Acknowledgement) allows us to admit and appreciate.
Netzach (Victory) teaches us to endure.
Yesod (Foundation) grounds the writing in truth.
Malkhut (Kingdom) is the voice—it is authorship, sovereignty, and authority.
Sherri discusses how to use “what if” questions to reimagine past events, not to deny them, but to create a sacred revision—insight. Memoir becomes mythic. The self becomes a character. And writing in the third person becomes a safe portal to enter the Holy of Holies—the parts of us too sacred or painful to expose in the first person.
The voice, she says, is not found. It is developed. It arises as you walk the path of the other Sephirot. And authority doesn’t come from being an expert in perfection. It comes from becoming an expert in your own experience—whether that’s being a master of grief, of chaos, of mistakes.
Ultimately, Sherri’s message is this: writing is sacred. Writing is revelation. Writing is survival. And if we honor it—if we write with love, humility, and honesty—it becomes not just a craft, but a calling.
“Trauma is the cave. Writing turns it into a bird’s nest—a place of light and new life.”
“The sacred is found not in the escape from suffering, but in the willingness to transmute it.”
“To write is to step into the holy of holies of your soul and say: I am ready to be seen.”
CVLT has over 2 decades of experience building international brands and now we have decided to focus exclusively in this space. so if you are looking to build your business then here are some of our key offerings
