On Fear How much control does fear have over your life? In the below post WordPress readers share their wisdom on fear. Readers share their insight and wisdom on handling failure and rejection when making art. via Overcoming Fear: Readers... Continue Reading →
The ironic result of these community responses telling victims to "deal" with their experiences "privately" is that "private dealing" is impossible. Others in the community steal victims' privacy rights. They take the victim's private, personal experience and turn it in to public stock. Before long, everyone's in on the trade. Even well-intentioned community members participate in robbing victims, buying shares in a stock that wasn't for sell. They purchase access through gossip, whispers, discussions, debates, deliberations, judgments. They possess what they did not experience, all while victims themselves are denied the right to own, acknowledge, or speak of their own experience--of acts done to them, not by them.
Saltwater pearls are considered rare and precious gems. They grow in mollusk shells along beds formed from extinct, eroded volcanos. One single pearl grows for years, facing threatening predators, crabs, and parasites. The few that survive emerge as beautiful smooth, translucent round layers reflecting light ... you are a pearl. A pearl of great price.
$1 per grope--that's how much a woman is worth. Too often, victims are questioned, humiliated, and further exposed only for their perpetrators to get off for less money than a cup of coffee ... it is unacceptable for sexual battery to cost less than a cup of coffee at Starbucks ... less than a fine for littering ... less than the penalty for spraying graffiti on the side of a building. Sentences like Judge Nauhaus' communicate females are worth less ... less than the dirt and grass beside our roadways ... less than chattel.
Rooted in dignity, we can act with integrity. Integrity is more than doing the "right" thing when no one is watching. Integrity is transparency, authenticity. It is owning our flaws. It is inspecting ourselves, our behaviors, our motives. Integrity is acting from a place of personal dignity, acting with respect to the dignity of others. Integrity is seeing others have worth simply because they ARE.
"'If we fail to hold our spouses and our children to the same standards, if we are unwilling or unable to provide a consequence when they do not meet the standard; and if our schools and churches and our government fail to hold themselves accountable to those they serve, there is but one thing to look forward to …'"
"When we tell our stories, we are sharing our light." The pictured painting inspired by my grandmother, a mother to nine. Though her house was always full, her heart seemed to never run out of space. She readily kept her... Continue Reading →
January is National Stalking Awareness Month. Read to learn more.
