The Other Latina on CNN

With all the focus on Soledad O’Brien these days, it’s only fair to mention the fact that her fellow CNN journalista, half Puerto Rican Jane Velez-Mitchell, recently released her second book. Velez-Mitchell, who is host of her own Headline News show, Issues with Jane Velez-Mitchell, released her first nonfiction book, Secrets Can Be Murder: What America's Most Sensational Crimes Tell Us About Ourselves, back in June 2008. As someone who has covered high-profile criminal cases for most of her career, including Michael Jackson’s child molestation trial, she knows a thing or two about the subject. Now the veteran TV journalist and nationally recognized addiction and recovery expert is back with iWant: My Journey from Addiction and Overconsumption to a Simpler, Honest Life (HCI), about her struggle with alcohol and nicotine, among other things, and her search for a balanced life centered around spiritual enlightenment.

Says Velez-Mitchell:

“This is the story of my changes, which took me from insanity to clarity, from egocentricity to altruism, from alcoholism to activism. These changes have marked an evolution in what I want from this life. I am what I want. What I seek to consume, possess, and achieve is a mirror that reflects my lusts and cravings, values and priorities, and moral boundaries or lack thereof. I am happy to say that what I want today is much less toxic and self-centered than what I used to want. It's taken decades of self-examination to peel back the layers and figure out what really makes me happy. And while I'm still searching for my ultimate bliss, I know for sure it's not what I once thought it was. It's not alcohol, cigarettes, money, food, sugar, or status symbols: I've consumed all of those in massive quantities, and they've just made me miserable. Now, I want what can't be tasted, smoked, worn, seen, or counted. It's the opposite of material. As sappy as it might sound, what I want is spiritual.”