memoir

The smell of cigarette smoke in the air in a tavern that changes names often,a bar cursed because of a girl who died of a drug overdose in the basement, we put a few coins in the jukebox;chose __ngel Band_ by Johnny Cash and sat down at the bar,ordered a soda, you wanted a whiskey on the rocks.We saw the coal miner who moved here from West Virginiaknocking back liquor like I drink sweet tea.No one asked why he was so solemn today.It was warm. It was relatively quiet.To anyone else, this place could feel sinister.But to us, it was freedom. It was a hiding place.No one was ever here long enough to know us.And we liked it that way.

Never let a man determine the woman you want to be.

The harsh dimness that follows loss isn__ static, but charged with the energy of immanent change. Hurt, I was left with a choice: wallow and stay in the dark, or seek light and fight to reach it. These two paths emerged. I had this choice to make. Loss is the shocking catalyst of transformation. I saw that this mountain valley, haunted by senseless murders, darker, had absorbed unthinkable violence and turned it into mesmerizing light. My rape became my catalyst. Rape gave me cause to flee the muteness _ forced me into making a bold and forceful change. I chose to fight to find a way to leave to seek my own strength and beauty. I was searching to find the way to make light.

I didn__ know if I was brave or reckless.

Being broken isn't the worst thing. We can be mended and put together again. We don__ have to be ashamed of our past. We can embrace the history that gives us value, and see our cracks as beautiful.

Writing a memoir is a holistic method of learning and healing by placing responsibility for personal transformation on the spiritual authority of the self. Writing a person__ life story is useful to gain a comprehensive understanding regarding a person__ maturation, distinctive stages of personal development, and the influences provided by their family and society. The writing processes also serves as a catharsis for painful personal events that a person seeks to integrate into their transmuting being. Writing our personal story, we discover new dimensions of our being.

...when I decided to be fully honest about whatever my heart undergoes, I found immense peace among the chaos of uncertainties. In my honesty and by acknowledging our big, big God, I found peace.

You know you're having a bad week when you call 911, the paramedics come to your house, and one of them notices you've rearranged your furniture.

I'd crossed a border__peaking openly, exposing the weak girl I'd been, I was no longer her.

Lesson learned: If a guy tells you you__e his second choice, don__ make him your first.

God has given us all our unique story. It's not one that flows easily or pretty, but the story is ours! Find it and treasure it...

I believe in beauty. I believe in goodness. I believe in the power of turning: the other cheek, time, curve of the earth.

Acts of love, for me, are leaps of bravery.

I want to share my story, and I want to know yours. I believe with all my heart that sharing our stories, the real, ugly, broken ones, is one of the most powerful things in the world, because to share our story we must first accept it. We must own it. We must stop running from it or shoving it into the corner when company comes over. To share our story is to admit that we've been changed.

Personal essay writing that incites the mind and instigates personal growth involves examination and re-examination, a process of noticing and reflecting upon what a person perceives. Essayistic writing is an osmotic process wherein a person intuitively absorbs information and ideas, allows inchoate thoughts to gestate in the unconscious mind, and then consciously places the emergent strands of language and logic into an orderly and expressive format.

The idea of practicing love is deeply appealing to me, because built right in is an acceptance of imperfection. There is an acknowledgment to myself that I am going to mess this up, an understanding that there is room to grow. Each of my failures just affirms the truth that we are all starting over and rising again.

This is our purpose: to make as meaningful as possible this life that has been bestowed upon us . . . to live in such a way that we may be proud of ourselves, to act in such a way that some part of us lives on. This is our purpose: to make as meaningful as possible this life that has been bestowed upon us . . . to live in such a way that we may be proud of ourselves, to act in such a way that some part of us lives on.

Have you ever gotten to a point where you looked at your own life, thought "Fu** this," and reached for the economy-sized Valium? Ah, suicide. So dark and seductive.