Philosopher. Spiritual Sleuth. Survivor of Self-Improvement.

Perhaps freedom does not come from perfecting the self or succeeding within the life we inherited. Perhaps it begins when we question who constructed that self, who designed that life, and whether ordinary reality is the limit of consciousness.

What if the life we have been given is not the limit of what we are?

Dr. Victoria Lynn Schmidt writes for women who want more than equality within the world as it is—or within spirituality as it has been handed down to us. She asks whether liberation requires strengthening the self, surrendering it, or discovering an entirely different relationship to it, while exploring consciousness, spirituality, power, and the difficult pursuit of freedom from the selves and lives we inherit.

A twice-doctored, Harvard-trained philosopher, Victoria blends memoir, feminist thought, spiritual neuroscience, humor, and scientific curiosity to explore what happens when women stop asking how to become better versions of themselves and begin asking more radical questions: Who authored the reality we take for granted? What is the self beneath the identities we have been given? And how free can a human being become?

Because changing the world may begin with questioning who authored our reality in the first place.

Animal welfare and human rights are also central to Victoria’s work and life, along with a commitment to living her feminism through ordinary daily choices.