Louise Hay—a writer, motivational speaker and founder of Hay House publishing house—has died at age 90.
“Meeting Louise changed the direction of my life,” Reid Tracy, president and CEO of Hay House, Inc., said in a statement posted on her website, according to a Los Angeles Blade article. Many saw Hay as a spiritual guru on the same level as Marianne Williamson and others.
Gay former Entertainment Tonight executive producer Brad Bessey said of Hay during the height of the AIDS epidemic, “She was so important to our movement—preaching love over fear and healing, hope and heart over hopelessness.”
In 1985, Louise began her support group The Hayride, with six men diagnosed with AIDS, according to the Hay House website. By 1988, the group had grown to a weekly gathering of 800 people and had moved to an auditorium in West Hollywood, California.
In 1987, what began as a small venture in the living room of her home turned into Hay House, Inc.
However, Hay was considered controversial. Although she advocated self-love and -improvement, it had been reported that she sometimes told people with AIDS that the patients were responsible for their own illness, leading some to contemplate suicide.
The service in honor of Louise L. Hay will be a private and intimate event, a PR Newswire item noted. Hay’s estate, as well as all future royalties, will be donated to The Hay Foundation, according to her website.
The Blade item is at www.losangelesblade.com/2017/08/30/aids-guru-louise-hay-dies-90/.