Barbara Sher
August 14, 1935 – May 10, 2020

Barbara Sher left us on May 10, 2020. She always reminded us that Isolation is the Dreamkiller. Almost a decade ago, Barbara began preparing for a time when she could no longer gather people together around her. She wanted to leave us with programs that would bring you and other dreamers and Scanners together to do all the things we love. These remain, led by people she trained to carry on for her, in Barbara’s Club and Sher Success Teams, where Barbara will continue to speak to us for many years to come.
 
 
 
From Barbara’s son, Matthew Pearl:

Bonn, Germany
13 May 2020

Our mother, Barbara Sher, died last Sunday. She was one of the great thinkers of our time. She would have been 85 this August 14th.

She was born in Depression-era Detroit. Her parents, like many of their generation, lived in fear and believed that the American Dream would equally apply to all and protect them from the horrors of past generations in Europe.

Mom had other plans: she moved to 1960s New York and raised two little boys by herself, starting on welfare and doing social work to feed us. She knew that dreams are fragile and can easily go to their graves with their unfulfilled dreamers, unless they are nurtured and supported by others (“Isolation is the Dream Killer”).

She decided to stop allowing the people who came to see her for counseling to dwell in the rooms of their past—the going trend—and instead to focus on realizing their wishes. (She used our last money to take out a full-page ad in the New York Times in the late 1970s that read, “Realizing your dreams can be more therapeutic than analyzing them.” The giant photo of herself in the ad was beautiful and powerful. Mom was neither self-absorbed nor vain, rather fully engaged in every moment, especially when it came to Danny and me.

Barbara Sher wrote, “What you love is what you are gifted at, there is NO exception.”

She taught the world this simple truth:

We were put on this earth to do more than use up natural resources. You are here to do what you are—not what your parents thought you should be—and you owe your gifts to the rest of us for the gift of being alive. We need the LOVE you feel when you are using your talents, as if all our lives depended on it (which they do, now more than ever).

At every one of the many retreats she and I ran together, she would say, often with tears in her eyes, “One of the saddest things I have ever heard is, ‘most of us will go to our graves with our music still in us.’” Mom did not. She did not believe that anyone, regardless of where they came from, should be forced to dream for small things. What she loved what was she was gifted at, and the world is a better place because of what she brought to the party.

Rest in Peace, Mama
I love you,
Bunny
 
 
 
From Barbara’s business partner, Patty Newbold:

It is with great sadness that I report to you Barbara Sher’s passing on Sunday, May 10, 2020, of natural causes. Please know that Barbara cared deeply about your dreams and your unique genius. She spent the last decade preparing for this eventuality by creating Hanging Out, the Survival Guide for Dreamers, her Book Clubs, her Idea Party and WriteSpeak and by preparing coaches and Success Teams leaders and WriteSpeak coaches and Book Club guides to carry on her work. She wanted to be sure you will have even more of her thinking than she could share in her many books, as well as people she trusted to assist you.

Barbara would remind you in this time of awful changes due to the pandemic that “Isolation is the Dreamkiller, not your lousy attitude.” Please share your wishes, your plans, your obstacles with other people, especially now. Barbara and I could not visit each other since March 11th, due to Covid-19 security measures, but as recently as Tuesday, we were discussing her latest Barbara’s Club project — and her craving for peanut butter and strawberry jam — by WhatsApp.

Barbara Sher, editing her Survival Guide for Dreamers in her living room
Credit: Jennifer Blair, NYC, 2017

Barbara was a middle child. She would have turned 85 on August 14th this year. After spending her preschool years in Detroit (where one of her relatives ran a speakeasy), her family moved to Los Angeles, where her parents, Sam and Nettie, ran a bar. After finishing high school, Barbara discovered the fascinating assortment of people to meet and subjects to study at UC Berkeley in the 1950s. She wanted to major in math at first, but she switched to anthropology, which allowed her more variety in her studies and fewer tortured homework sessions.

She married and divorced twice. In between, she found herself a single mom with two young children on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. She loved New York City, but life was hard. I’ll let her tell you, in the words from her TEDx talk (I really hope you are among the almost 2.5 million people who have watched it):

When I was about 36, I had just gotten through a very bad year. I’d gotten a divorce, I had no money, I was in New York City, I had two very small children. I couldn’t get a daycare center, so I couldn’t take a job. We stayed in welfare hotels in New York; that’s worth writing a novel about. They have cockroaches, so I would tell the kids, we could name the cockroaches, and we played “early computer games” with cockroaches on the wall.

But we got a daycare center, I got a job, we got an apartment, and the kids were in school. And I was washing dishes when I was 36, and I thought, “By God, we made it.” The kids were great, I cried a lot, but we did it. We did it, that’s good, I’m proud of myself.

And then I had another thought. I thought, “Is this it? Is that what I get? Is my gravestone going to say, “Her house was frequently clean for very brief periods of time?”

It was still the era when the truly interesting jobs were almost all in the Help Wanted – Male column of the newspaper. She found one on her own, running confrontational encounter groups for a psychiatrist. In Barbara’s words:

I was in the group and he said, “You’re hired; you can be a leader.” Because I was good at it; in my family, we always hollered at each other. And it was a natural ability, I didn’t think much of it, and I had groups every night after work.

Then one day, working in a group with a longtime, challenging client she calls Ronnie (you’ve probably heard her tell his story), Barbara discovered something that worked a lot faster and better: Success Teams. Working together toward our dreams. Asking for help with obstacles. Holding each other accountable. Wanting each other’s success even more than our own. Pitching in where our talents could help another person get what they most wanted.

Barbara shared what was working in her very first book, Wishcraft. published in 1979. By the time the 30th Anniversary Edition was published in 2009, over a million copies had already been sold. More books followed: Teamworks! (the only one that’s out of print), I Could Do Anything If I Only Knew What It Was (1994), Live the Life You Love (1996), It’s Only Too Late If You Don’t Start Now (1998), Barbara Sher’s Idea Book (2003) and Refuse to Choose! (2006).

Over the years, Barbara’s books have been translated into many other languages. Most recently, those in Russia and Eastern Europe, where people are now able to start their own businesses, have joined her millions of fans worldwide.

Barbara quickly became an in-demand speaker at corporations and conferences, a PBS pledge-week star, one of Oprah’s favorite guests of the entire year Barbara appeared on the show. She had never even heard of speaker as a career, but she nailed it, giving millions of people new hope and practical tools for making their craziest wishes come true. Barbara was one of the first life coaches, doing private sessions with many lucky people over the years. In 2006, she began running retreats in Europe and the US, starting with a Scanner Retreat on the island of Corfu.

Barbara Sher, outdoors at retreat, thinking
Credit: Tammy Garver, Corfu, 2006

Throughout all of this, Barbara fought back against numerous awful health issues, bouncing back again and again. She wrote I Could Do Anything while dealing with breast cancer and the threat of not finishing the book in time. She still wrote such an important, life-changing book that it made the New York Times Best Seller list.

In 2007, Barbara launched her WriteSpeak program, to help others with a message get their books and workshops created and promoted. She taught her last WriteSpeak Teleworkshops in March of this year, but we had already compiled enough recordings from earlier WriteSpeak classes that when she had to miss one of them, things went on just fine. From 2010 to 2014, Barbara taught a bunch of great people to use her life coaching methods.

In 2011, Barbara began a project that she had long dreamed of, called Hanging Out. She stepped back from her usual practical methods — and her focus on going after dreams — to invite us to just explore who we are and what delights us. Hanging Out launched in April of 2012, and it will continue as long as there are people who want to peel away a few more layers of resistance to uncover new interests and dreams. In 2014, her online Book Clubs began, a chance to do the exercises in her books with lots of support and company.

Throughout all this, Barbara had other hobbies, like any good Scanner. She was fascinated by the Silk Road and even built herself a model of its geography. She bought a farm in the Catskills and grew apples and chickens and fresh vegetables, nestled among dairy farms, with sunsets to die for. She bought a cave house in Turkey and invented what she called “plop philanthropy” — just plop yourself wherever you are and help. She created a place where women could learn the traditional weaving techniques of the region and gave them laptops and helped them set up a non-profit to sell their hand-loomed rugs. She discovered Usenet and The Source and the internet and kept finding new ways to connect people. She taught herself to paint by copying and recopying her favorite painting until she could reproduce it.

Barbara Sher and her dog Buddy by Mindy Stricke
Credit: Mindy Stricke

Barbara’s love extended to a number of dogs who were family to her and lived and traveled with her throughout her life, including Fipo, rescued in Greece, and Buddy, a tiny rescued Yorkie.

Many of you have written to Barbara about your dreams, your relief at discovering her books, or the ways in which she changed your life. She has boxes and boxes of these letters and many folders full of emails on her laptop, too. Your letters meant the world to her. She felt so connected to you. She wanted so much for you. Jennifer Blair, who was her co-author and editor for the Survival Guide for Dreamers, reminded me today that she dedicated the Guide to Eleanor F, “who sent me this letter many years ago and whose voice is always in my mind when I write my books.”

This is Eleanor’s letter:

“Dear Barbara,

Thank you. Although your book may have come too late for me (I’m 74). Why did it take me so long to find your book? Why didn’t I hear about it? I wish I knew. It should be required reading in our schools. Kindergarteners should know parts of it, and it should be part of teacher education. It should be required reading for every expectant parent, or a hand-out in every gynecologist’s office.

I could have been an architect, an interior decorator, a health care professional, a writer, a linguist, a world traveler and an instigator of individual cultural preservation around the world. I could have had a house which I designed high on a cliff overlooking any view of my own choosing! I could have been a member of the medical team on the ship HOPE! I could have had my own wild animal preserve in Africa, devoting my life to care and preservation.

When I longed to enter a nurse’s training after high school, it was forbidden by my stern but caring parents. “You’ll have to see male body parts, and that’s unlady-like” I was told. So I remained a “lady” and sold flowers in flower shops, worked as a sales girl in other stores, was a typist, a “secretary,” a file clerk.

I’m still trying. I’m half-way through my first novel, but I’m acutely aware of what the odds are for a first novel.

Thank you again for your book. It kept me awake all night choosing my colors (yellow and purple), etc. etc. I still feel defeated, but I’m happier because I finally know why I was such a failure when I had such dreams -SUCH DREAMS!”

Do what you love! All of it. It is the heart of Barbara’s message to us. If you are looking for a way to honor her life as you grieve her passing today, that is the way to do it. And if you’re a Hanging Out member, maybe stick a twig of rosemary in your pocket to remind you.

Barbara leaves behind her two brothers, Arthur and Kenneth Sher; a talented and adventurous grandson she adored, Leo Sher; and two sons. Her firstborn, Danny Pearl, is a musician who cared for Barbara through a difficult illness last fall. Her younger son, Matthew Pearl, many of you know from WriteSpeak, her Scanner retreats in Europe, or from his skillful editing of Refuse to Choose!

We will miss her infectious enthusiasm, but Barbara’s work will continue. I (Patty Newbold) will continue to work online with the brilliant and talented team Barbara chose: Doret Jordaan, Tammy Garver, and Patrice Jenkins. Matthew Pearl and Gundrun Schwarzer will continue her work in Europe. And her many Success Teams leaders and Barbara Sher Coaches will continue her work all around the globe.

Barbara Sher, smiling, in a blue shirt, holding a book
Credit: Matthew Pearl, Saarbrucken, Germany, 2018

Let me leave you with a few great quotes from my very dear friend, Barbara.

“When you play it too safe, you’re taking the biggest risk of your life. Time is the only wealth we’re given.”

“Imaginary obstacles are insurmountable. Real ones aren’t.”

“Every single one of us can do things that no one else can do — can love things that no one else can love. We are like violins. We can be used for doorstops, or we can make music.”

“The amount of good luck coming your way depends on your willingness to act.”

“You must go after your wish. As soon as you start to pursue a dream, your life wakes up and everything has meaning.”

Patty Newbold

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126 thoughts on “Barbara Sher
August 14, 1935 – May 10, 2020

  1. Hi;

    I am very sorry to hear of the passing of Barbara. I only must found out about her great work and watched her on a TedTalk. I actually reached out to her via email.

    Again my Deepest Sympathy to the family and friends of Barbara.

    Ms. Guida Feliz
    Toronto, Canada

  2. Yah… she was very interesting: I worked with her at group Labs.
    I also know Mikki Raver… another story.
    Good Luck!
    TY, Neal Hugh Hurwitz, NY NY/Medellin? ISR

  3. Dearest fellow dreamers/do-ers,
    How can I get started!??? What should I read first? How can I scrape myself up from where I am today to live a full life and make at least one dream come true for me.
    I was literally ‘squashed’ by my family, always the daydreaming black sheep told I would never amount to anything. YET, I meet people on the street or at a school and they say ‘wow, you are so funny and brilliant, what do you do?’ I pause, always embarrassed by the menial work I do. I have always always wanted to be a speaker and have had much practice with strangers, giving them hope and encouragement even for a minute. If I do this in front of my Dad it’s always “shhhh, you’re embarrassing me”. It was dad who told me I wasn’t smart enough to move through life successfully and even suggested I never have a relationship in case “I ruin someone else’s life”. Every time I try and do something I love I just hear his voice calling me “hopeless” and that it will be “impossible” for me to achieve.
    What should I read so Barbara’s voice can be loud enough to drown out my father’s?
    Please let me know, my potential really has no bounds but how can I tap into it.
    Yours sincerely,
    Deborah Boman

  4. Beautiful. I read Barbaras book Wishcrate and I could do anything If I only knew what..in the early 90’s. I still have the copy of I could do anything…. Her books encouraged me to dream and seek what I COULD do. I changed my career and went from a successful cleaning business to teaching workshops and my super goal at the time: teaching computer classes. And Ive continued to grow, changing careers again at 47. Now as I reach retirement…I am again drinking in Barabara’s words and videos….reaching out for my next big dream and phase. Im very sorry to hear of her passing…Oh but she will remaim SO ALIVE IN MY MIND N HEART.

  5. This is what the world needs now. Just like before…and after… 😉

    Thank you Barbara ! Thank you team, keep it going, have fun !

  6. They say it is never too late; it is. She is gone and I just discovered her. I will check out Hanging Out and hope it is not too late for me to make a difference.

      • Thank You Patty. I am beginning my journey NOW. Not sure where to start as I am jumping in in the middle. When I was younger, in the 80’s I attended groups and workshops (short version here) and they are no longer offered here. I would love to offer workshops for others but where to start and how to do that is what I will be looking for. Thanks again for responding.

        • Start with Meetup.com. Post anything you are interested in and see who comes. Lead the meeting to see how happy this role makes you. Ask people why they decided to come, so you learn what to say to get people to workshops they pay you for. Record what you say and get it transcribed, then circle anything you want to remember to use again. Then try a second topic and learn more. Remember to collect everyone’s email addresses, so you can invite them to everything you offer in the future.

          Never try to launch a full-grown, replaces-my-day-job business. Take baby steps and learn as much as possible from each one. You can do this, Lori!

  7. I discovered Barbara Sher the night before this one that I’m in the middle of now… I discovered a Ted-talks video she did that I watched on my cell phone in bed! I couldn’t wait to share my discovery of her with my daughter, Mary. I’m 64 and feel like I discovered my soul’s sister! I got home from my daughter’s house around 9pm, so exhausted that I think I fell asleep almost before my head hit the pillow… I woke at 3am and continued searching and listening to Barbara on you-tube. Here it’s 4:30(ish) in the morning and upon discovering she had passed away, I’m in bed, my cell phone in hand (don’t have a computer), weeping over the loss of her, as if we were close friends or sisters!
    Mary is my third of eight children. My ex-husband moved us 500 miles from family and friends 18 months before serving me with divorce papers. I was shocked. Five of our children were under18. That was 20+ years ago. Resigning myself to do what was best for the children, I strove to make all my decisions(big ones and the myriad of daily little ones), in their best interest – as best as I could. Taking on menial jobs here and there, reluctantly going on government assistance when I absolutely had to, we stumbled a lot but did make it through the worst of it all.
    Here I am, feeling as if I’m alone on the ground, surrounded by the countless shattered dreams(like the fallen leaves of the trees in mid-autumn) of my broken life. My children and grandchildren are like rays of warm, golden sunshine or wafts of beautiful symphonies to me… yet I’m still alone and broken at the end of each day.
    I see the absolute Blessing Barbara was and still is to countless soul’s on their journey through life.
    Here is my question; with the limited picture that I’ve tried to provide you with of where I am right now, which of her books do you think I could derive the most from, at this point in my own journey? I’d buy all of them in a heartbeat, if I could! However, I cannot afford to purchase even one, my financial sutuation is bleak, to put it mildly. However, I’m going to purchase one anyway. I know her writings are full of pearls of wisdom! My question, again;
    Which one?
    Thank you, in advance, for the time you’ve spent reading this and, most of all, for your recommendation!
    Peace and Blessings! – Ellen

    • You can start with the first one, Wishcraft. The original edition (the 30th anniversary edition differs only in the introduction) is available to download at http://wishcraft.com

      Wishcraft has all sorts of practical advice on how to go after any dream or wish. Pick one, even a tiny one, and try those steps. You’ll find your confidence building, and you’ll probably make a bunch of friends.

      I Could Do Anything is the one to read when you’re going after a dream and keep bumping up against an invisible brick wall: you don’t know why, but you keep stopping at the same point. Barbara calls it Resistance, and she takes you through the most common causes. I love Refuse to Choose for its great guidance on how to enjoy more than one grand interest in your life, but first we need to get you up off the ground.

      For a bit of inspiration, if you’re thinking 64 is too old: my mother was near death’s door at 83. She volunteered for an experimental new surgery, and it saved her life, but she couldn’t walk for more than maybe three minutes before needing to sit. It took two years before she could even plant a garden.

      During those years, I asked her what’s still on her bucket list. I thought it would be something like a trip, and I could push her around Friesland in a wheelchair. But it was to own and work her own organic vegetable farm and sell the vegetables at the farmer’s market. And she would not consider anything less than the full dream, so she spent her time reading everything she needed to know. She bought the land and the tractor at 86 and farmed until her 90th birthday.

      What would you like to try over the 26 years until you turn 90? Which of your children would find them fun to help with or at least cheer you on? (Remember, family never cheers you on unless you’re doing something that sounds like fun and doesn’t threaten their future, so pick just one or two per adventure.) And do come join the Idea Party at https://barbarasclub.com/ideaparty/ and the Telesummit at https://barbarasclub.com/telesummit/

      • Thank you Patty!!!
        I’ve begun reading that download…
        it’s already helping me to remember far back and long ago.
         That story about your mom is incredible to me!  That’s almost exactly what I had wanted to do for decades!  To grow organic veggies and fruits and build my own roadside farmstand to sell them!!! It’s actually part of a bigger dream I used to have that Included educating all who would listen to me about the dangers of food that is ‘conventually’ grown by big agri-business. If your mom can do that in her 80’s, maybe I can too!  The equipment is very pricey, so I’ll have to figure out how to obtain the equipment to accomplish it all!
             I’m so amazed at what I’m reading AND it’s filling me with the joy I had in my childhood!  Thank You!  Thank You!  Thank You! 

        • You are most welcome. I hope you will share your story with us as it unfolds. Start with a little equipment, used. Or sell shares to raise cash and pay folks off in vegetables. And start your blog about food dangers now. Or create YouTube videos about it. Or show up at farmer’s markets and offer to help sell veggies in return for some guidance on launching your own farm and choosing what to plant to make sure there’s a good variety among all the farmers. If you think reading about what’s possible fills you with joy, you should see what actually taking some baby steps in the right direction will do.

    • Ellen, reading your life as it is and was is like writing my own. I am your age, single mom, raised two daughters and am paying the price for poor financial decisions. Mountains of debt and menial skills I will be watching to see what Patty says to start with. Maybe together we can conquer this together! Love you girl! Lori

      • Hi Lori, although I did make decisions that we’re financially disastrous and , at times, I wish I could go back and redo a few of them, I don’t regret them now. I prayed through it all and made my decisions based on what was best for my children at the time. Those poor financial decisions I made actually taught life lessons to my children. It’s much more important to base life on Truth and Love than on money (Matthew 16:26).
        Money sure does make life easier, but an easy life never forms good character. I’ve always looked at money as a tool to provide and serve people, not as an end in itself. In my lifetime, I’ve come across too many people that use other people and love money and all it can buy. That surely makes for an empty life. I sure wish I discovered Barbara Sher decades ago. It might have made a lovely difference for us… But it’s not too late. I do believe it’s​ precisely on time!
        We sure can conquer this together! Love you too, girl!
        -Ellen 🙂

    • Hi there Ellen,

      It sounds like you’ve been through a lot (and are still going through hard times). Sorry to hear this. One thing to encourage you:

      I have been reading lots of Barbara’s books via the Internet Archive’s library. People have scanned copies of each page, and now they are available to read at no cost. To read the whole book all you have to do is register a free account. This link will take you directly to browse most of her books: https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Sher%2C+Barbara%2C+1943-%22

      I pray you are restored to dreaming, and find wisdom and courage to pick up the pieces. It sounds like you’re on to something there with your idea of organic farming 🙂 God bless you. Josh

  8. I’ve been successfully using the principles and techniques from “Wishcraft” for several decades. These led me to a vibrant career allowing me to train thousands more about them. I just this month pulled my original copy of “Wishcraft” (jammed packed with pages of completed exercises) out of my bookcase because I was developing yet another training and I wanted to quote her properly. I decided for the first time to delve into Barbara’s online presence. I regret not doing that sooner since I see what a wonderful wealth of content and community lives here. I also did not know of Barbara’s death and am saddened to learn of it. At the same time, I am truly grateful that her work lives on since the world is in as much need of her genius as ever.

    • So glad you found us, Valerie! We miss Barbara dearly, but her work cannot stop. Sounds like you’ll be helping keep it going, too. Thank you.

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