So often survivors have had their experiences denied, trivialized, or distorted. Writing is an important avenue for healing because it gives you the opportunity to define your own reality. You can say: This did happen to me. It was that bad. It was the fault & responsibility of the adult. I was—and am—innocent.” The Courage to Heal by Ellen Bass & Laura Davis

Ellen Bass

Categorized in : Writing Healing Responsibility

Allow yourself to release the emotions you have struggled all you... by Ellen Bass

Allow yourself to release the emotions you have struggled all your life to contain.

release emotion healing

There's a part of every living thing that wants to become itself: the tadpole into the frog, the chrysalis into the butterfly, a damaged human being into a whole one.That is spirituality.

butterfly growth integrity

to love life, to love it even when you have no stomach for it and everything you've held dear crumbles like burnt paper in your hands, your throat filled with the silt of it. When grief sits with you, its tropical heat thickening the air, heavy as water more fit for gills than lungs; when grief weights you like your own flesh only more of it, an obesity of grief, you think, How can a body withstand this? Then you hold life like a face between your palms, a plain face, no charming smile, no violet eyes, and you say, yes, I will take you I will love you, again.

grief hope love-you

There is a comfort in knowing that you don’t have to pretend anymore, that you are going to do everything within your power to heal.

heal knowing comfort

What would people look like by Ellen Bass

What would people look like

honey people looks

It's impossible to feel good about yourself if you are doing things that you aren't proud of. . . . It's essential that you . . . [do] things you can respect and admire.

essentials feel-good proud

Everyone has the right to tell the truth about her own life. by Ellen Bass

Everyone has the right to tell the truth about her own life.

telling-the-truth

So much inspires me. People living their lives with courage, beauty of all kinds, nature in all its aspects, people I love and people I hardly know, and, of course, other poets.

kind inspire people

I live in Santa Cruz. I moved here in 1974 and couldn't leave. by Ellen Bass

I live in Santa Cruz. I moved here in 1974 and couldn't leave.

santa-cruz moved santa

Then you hold life like a face between your palms, a plain face, no charming smile, no violet eyes, and you say, yes, I will take you I will love you, again.

charming-smile eye love-you

Poetry is the most intimate of all writing. I want to speak first from me to myself and then from me to you.

want writing firsts

If you’ve managed to do one good thing, by Ellen Bass

If you’ve managed to do one good thing,

apples ocean earth

Visualizing how you want to be is [an] effective way to move towa... by Ellen Bass

Visualizing how you want to be is [an] effective way to move toward your goal.

goal way moving

I think many people love poetry who don't know they love it. People are sometimes afraid of poetry, or they've been introduced to poetry that doesn't speak to them.

sometimes people thinking

Garrison Keillor read several of my poems on 'The Writer's Almanac' and I've heard from listeners nationally and internationally. That's one of the great gifts of email.

great-gifts email heard

No matter how many vitamins you take, how much Pilates, you'll lose your keys, your hair and your memory.

keys hair memories

Your wallet will be stolen, you'll get fat, slip on the bathroom tiles of a foreign hotel and crack your hip.

tiles cracks hips

Exercise stimulates your circulation, massages your internal organs, stretches and strengthens your muscles, and energizes you. Exercise is also a great way to discharge tension, work through emotional blocks, release anger, and gain self-esteem.

block self-esteem life

I wanted to be a writer since I was in high school, but I never t... by Ellen Bass

I wanted to be a writer since I was in high school, but I never thought it was possible.

high-school wanted school