Russell Simmons, “CEO of Hip-Hop”, who helped create  Def Jam Records, Phat Farm, and Def Comedy Jam, recently helped create a spiritual reality show on MTV, Run’s House.  Run’s House is about Russell’s brother and his family resolving their issues by operating under God’s laws.  This show was one of the highest debuts in MTV history and is currently preparing for its third season.  It is refreshing to watch a reality show about a family helping each other resolve their conflicts rather than tear each other down or resort to drugs and alcohol to deal with their problems.  

However, MTV was not immediately receptive to this program.  They did not think that people wanted to watch a show about God and family on Thursday night.  Russell Simmons had to call many executives at MTV and even the president of Viacom at least ten times just to get a meeting.  No one was listening to his idea about this show at first.  But, he kept calling MTV, stood by his vision and eventually MTV agreed to put the show on.  This is a perfect example of how spiritual television can entertaining, uplifting and a financial success for a mainstream audience. 

Horton Hears a Who is a movie based on a Dr. Seauss book about an elephant, Horton, who is trying to protect a microscopic community that nobody else believes exists.  Although this movie is geared towards children, adults may find pleasure in some of its metaphysical questions.  For example, one of the protagonists in the movie asks Horton, “If you can’t see it, feel it, or hear it, then how can it (the microscopic community) exist?”  Horton has to convince his friends that he isn’t crazy for listening to the voices that come from a microscopic speck that he is trying to protect.  Similar to Field of Dreams, this movie asks us to trust the voice inside of us that offers guidance even when other people question its direction and our sanity.    

Oprah Winfrey has teamed up with Eckhart Tolle to conduct an online class on Tolle’s book A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose.  Over 700,000 people signed up for the class.  The classes are free and take place on Mondays for the next 10 weeks.  The sessions have no formal structure, but will inlcude streaming questions from participants.  Additionally, they will discuss what each chapter means and how to apply it your life.  According to Winfrey, Tolle’s book, “helps us to distance ourselves from our egos, which, of course open ourselves to a higher self, which he calls consciousness.  It helps us to stop creating our own suffering and obsessing over the past and what the future might be.”  Tolle went from suicidal despair to inexplicable bliss during a spiritual transformation in 1977.  Tolle’s publishers have shipped 3.5 million copies of A New Earth since Winfrey selected it for her book club.  In order to register, visit www.oprah.com/anewearth.