About

Meet Shelley Maurice-Maier

Shelley says her journey toward spiritual health and maturity—and toward becoming a medical practitioner, Christian counselor, and inspirational speaker—began with the diagnosis of a rare autoimmune disease called (EG) or Eosinophilic Gastroenteritis. Its debilitating symptoms included full-body eczema, asthma, migraines, abdominal pain, and sensitivity to numerous foods and the environment. By the time Shelley was four years old, pain had become the unrelenting focus of her life. Abuse would further mar her innocence and inflict emotional pain.

” I never could have anticipated,” she says, “that those experiences would become the fertile ground in which God would grow in me a passion to not only overcome life’s challenges – but to reach out and help others to do the same.”

Gifted with a singing voice and strong presentation skills, Shelley majored in music and performing arts at USC, later performing with troupes throughout Europe. Upon returning to the United States she was employed in TV commercials, radio, and musical comedy stage productions.

Shelley became the lead singer of a small musical combo and, while on tour in Alaska, met and married a commercial fisherman.

Over time she worked as a state-certified public safety officer, a firefighter, and an emergency medical technician. Then, in 1982, she was accepted into a postgraduate program at the University of Washington in Seattle for certification as a physician assistant in family medicine.

With a medical license as a P.A., she returned to Anchorage, where she taught primary medicine to rural, indigenous Alaskans. Her first marriage having ended in divorce, she remarried, and in 1988 she and husband Kenneth Maier, MD, moved to Oregon to practice family medicine together.

Pursuing her passion to teach and speak, Shelley established a nonprofit corporation she called The Heart of Health, Inc.

She began production of a weekly television series interviewing internationally recognized physicians and psychologists on such subjects as the effectiveness of prayer, acupuncture, homeopathy, biofeedback, and nutrition. In a moving story, she recounts her own experience with physical healing by faith:

“In March of 1996, though very ill again with EG, or Eosinophilic Gastroenteritis, I required large amounts of prednisone and other life-sparing medications to keep the symptoms at bay. Nevertheless, I traveled to California to interview Larry Dossey, MD, about his book, Healing Words: The Power of Prayer in Medicine, for my television series. By the time Ken and I boarded our plane for home, I was exhausted, but I knew I earnestly desired the kind of healing Dr. Dossey spoke about in his practice. As I reclined in my airplane seat, I prayed, ‘Father, if it is Your will for me, I ask that You heal me.’ Though struggling with doubt, I continued to pray until sleep overtook me.”

“While sleeping and shortly after waking with the sensation of goosebumps over my entire body, I turned to Ken and said, ‘I know this may sound odd, but I believe I have just been healed.’ Three days later, much to the concern of my husband and specialists, I chose to stop all medications. Today I am still free from the symptoms of EG.”

Shelley’s miraculous healing brought her to a turning point in life.

Through it, she came to a deeper understanding of the connection between mind, body, and spirit and how important it is to have a personal relationship with God. Engaged in this new relationship and equipped with a new understanding of health, she would later overcome the challenges of several major surgeries, metastatic cancer, and a near-death experience.

“God had always been pursuing a relationship with me. Now I began actively pursuing one with Him. I’d always wondered: Can years of being harmed by and of harming others really be undone by a simple act of faith? Now I knew the answer: It is not that the harm can be undone, but that God can and will redeem it. He will use it for His purposes.”

Today the author of The Sampler: Ten Life-Enhancing Concepts Right at your Finger Tips, The Soul Factor: What Is the Soul’s Role in Healing?, and Pathways to Godly Self-Love: Crossing the Healing Bridge, Shelley is a Christian counselor in private practice in Bend, Oregon. She and Ken enjoy their 17 grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Shelley participates in volunteer work, church activities, singing with The Harmonettes professional trio, and serving on the staff of GentleLion, where she teaches workshops/classes based on her three books.

Through her ministry, The Heart of Hope and Healing, Shelley offers weekend workshops and retreats, helping individuals find their way to love through healing.