Marianne Williamson is on a path of transformation. The new age spiritual and health guru envisions herself as a politician. Marianne Williamson is running for California's state congress.

Marianne is running for a seat in the U.S. House, representing California's District 33.

Marianne Williamson was born and grew up in Houston and spent a few years living in Detroit during the late '90s before she made her home in Los Angeles. Marianne Williamson, 61, announced her run for a U.S. House of Representatives seat last month. The New Age guru teaches self-transformation and believes miracles happen in everyday life.

Marianne Williamson said it was Washington's dysfunction that prompted her throw her hat in the race. She said "I think I'm one of the millions of Americans who feel we are living a confluence of crises at this moment. And there comes a point where the change that needs to happen cannot just come from the sidelines or online petitions."

Williamson says "the cancer underlying all other cancers" is that "The American government has lost its ethical center and its deep commitment to democracy. ... drifting ever more consistently in a corporatist direction. I believe that fighting the influence of money on our politics is the greatest moral challenge of our generation."

The author and speaker is running against popular Democrat Rep. Henry Waxman. He has been in office for almost 40 years. Williamson says she's not that far off from Waxman's policies, she's even  voted for him a few times, but Williamson is running as an Independent. She said "I don't hear the Democrats or the Republicans fundamentally addressing the forces that make so much unnecessary suffering inevitable in this country. They are not discussing them because there is no financial leverage on the part of those who are suffering the most."

Williamson said: "Both parties are invested in a system that amounts to legalized corruption and legalized bribery. And unless we make that itself a cry of the heart and demand a constitutional amendment outlawing the undue influence of money on our politics, I believe the current trajectory amounts to nothing less than a death spiral for American democracy."

So, in a country that separates church and state, how does Williamson see her candidacy as faith-based person? She says "I love the quote from Mahamta Ghandi who said: 'Anyone who thinks that religion doesn't have anything to do with politics doesn't understand religion.' I don't think there is any serious spiritual path that give us a pass on addressing suffering of other human beings. You know, spirituality is the path of the heart. How can we say that we are following a path of heart but ignoring the fact that one in five American children live in poverty? How can we say that we're following path of the heart and yet not address the high incarceration rate in this country? I'm talking about a politics of conscience."