With numerous published columns and two books, one titled Pleasures and Ponderings: From Nun to Nudist to Now, West Seattle life coach, speaker, and poet Moreah Vestan likes to provoke. The curmudgeon may ruffle feathers, but her art is avoiding conflict, not creating it.

Moreah (rhymes with Gloria) Vestan has presented at IBM, Bank of America, Discover U, Unity Church, Edmonds Community College, Senior Center of West Seattle, Real Estate Assn. of Puget Sound (REAPS), Gay City U and County Libraries. Her workshops have included Ten Fatal Dating Mistakes and how to Avoid Them, 11 Principles for the Pursuit of Pleasure, Managing Stress, Procrastination Resources, and Renting Out Rooms without Regrets. Vestan currently shares her big house with six roommates and said she takes her own advice to keep her home harmonious.


Vestan will be teaching a class out of her home near Morgan Junction on nonviolent communication, Dec. 28 and Jan. 11, 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. Called "Building Peace One Conversation at a Time" the class will discuss Marshall Rosenberg's Nonviolent Communication Process. He is director of Educational Services for the Center for Nonviolent Communication.

Vestan will also host her monthly potluck followed by the "Mars Venus Game", a sort of truth or dare open to all brave souls beginning 6:00 p.m., January 8.
  
In her writings Vestan states, "When you know that everyone does the best they know how to try to meet their needs, and you work to connect with your and their needs, you can create win-win communication. Yes, we all have disappointments. And if we didn't take things personally, we could accept, accommodate, live with whatever is in our lives."

She recalled her less rebellious childhood years as an "Iowa Farm Girl."

"I was authority-ridden," said Vestan. "Anything the Catholic Church or my parents told me to do, I thought I didn't have any option.

"I thought, 'Well, I'm a good girl so God probably wants me to be a nun', so I ended up with the St. Joseph order in Milwaukee and at the end of the year the Mother General asked each of us if we were happy. I said I was 'satisfied but not happy'. Wise woman that she was, she said that was not enough for a bride of the Lord, so I basically got booted which delights me because, I swear to God, I would probably still be a nun today because I knew nothing else at the time. I knew only obedience and all this kind of stuff. Leaving was my ticket to freedom, to think for myself."

I was a virgin until I got married at 26. There was nothing wrong with who my husband was, but I was not getting my philosophical needs met. I divorced about eight years later, in 1975. Then I was a free spirit."

Vestan's other book, Diving Right In: Reflecting on Life’s Adventures includes two photos mounted side by side. On the left, an elegantly fading B&W portrait of Rosalie Rita Theresa Honrath, (Vestan's birth name) in her postulant’s habit on a vacation from the convent, perched on a horse by her dad on the Iowa farm. On the right, a garish color snapshot of Vestan playing dress-up as a dominatrix at a Seattle Erotic Art Festival event at Seattle Center.

While she said she was kind of goofing around in that photo, she added, "If there is such a thing as sin, then it is a sin for people to feel guilty for self pleasure."

Vestan, a youthful 69, mother of two and grandmother of one, and another on the way, hits the gym at Harold's Fitness three times a week to practice tai chi, yoga, and weight lifting. Now a member of Westside Unitarian Universalist Congregation on California Ave. and Othello St., Vestan's politics lean to the left.

"Seven of the nine of us siblings are Republicans," she said with mild resignation. "My brother Allan and I are the black sheep. But we all love each other."

If Vestan projects one message, it is that she lives her philosphy.

"If I can come from a place of connecting instead of correcting for instance, I can be happier," she said. "If I am in touch with my empathy, and I hear what is important to you, I value that even if I have a different perspective. I honor the feelings in you. People's minds are more likely to be able to change if they're going to be heard first.

"I have averted a lot of potential conflicts," she continued. "When I get caught in, 'Oh God, another day and I didn't get 16 things done', I try to stop myself from that. I was running across the street to the bus to get to a Sustainable West Seattle event that I really wanted to go to. The bus driver saw me waving and just drove by and I was pissed. I got in touch with 'OK. This is not going to work'. It was raining hard. I stopped and I got in touch with 'I love it when I am so clear about what is important to me that I don't let anything get in the way' and I walked a half mile up the hill and another mile further and I was soaked when I got there, but all the angst and frustration was gone. I love practicing, "I love it when..." I do it all the time with anything that comes up."

Although open-minded and at ease with her gift of communicating, even in difficult situations Vestan acknowledges that connecting with others can sometimes be troublesome, a lesson she learned after placing a singles ad online.

"I met a Pentecostal," she said. "He was a fine man, but at some point I was like, 'I don't think so.'"

She said she may be better off searching for another Unitarian.

For classes and other information, phone Moreah Vestan (206) 938-8385, or check out her websites, posted above.

Also, email her at: moreah@comcast.net