Self-respect doesn't come naturally to me. I need to constantly remind myself and do the work to err on the side of self-respect, rather than self-punishment.

It's a beautiful aspect of narrative construction, hunting for the right images and metaphors to render our character's hearts/minds/souls as though they're ecosystems, full-fledged settings for a reader to inhabit like a place.

I just thought it was important that people knew right from the jump that I've got problems. But in all seriousness, that's a huge part of my writing process.

I always feel that as the author, once I know what a character is ashamed of, then I can go about making her truthful on the page.

In my life the right question is simply this: What can I do to be happy today?

Yes, things happened to me - brutal things - but I'm not going to give them so much clout by dwelling on them, empowering them to haunt my heart years after the events transpired. And no good comes from that. These ghosts don't need us to help them stay alive. If we're after real deal healing, these ghosts must desiccate.

Memoirs need confusion. It's the thing every human has in common. We are magnificently confused.