If You Will Listen, We Can Talk About Anything

They say that your life, your struggle, your story will someday be someone else's survival guide. It's true! And here it is. There were days I could not eat, I could not sleep. It was all I could do to keep breathing. But I could pray, and I had a pen. Somehow, by writing and sorting my thoughts, I found the clarity to keep going. Somehow I felt that my story might help someone else. While I was in the middle of it, I only caught tiny glimpses of how much the writing actually helped me. I can tell you now, this book saved my life! It wasn't just the writing, but editing and rereading my own story to see the lessons. I could see myself learning empathy. I could see how the fear had settled down because of gratitude and forgiveness. In the end, I could see how I wanted to survive to give this gift to anyone else who may be struggling alone in the dark. This is a book about how I wrote the book that saved my life.

I hope this book can give people the courage to see things a little differently, to talk about things they've been afraid to say, to listen with an open mind and possibly view things from another person's perspective. And most of all, I hope it gives us an opportunity to change. We could do so much good if only we were willing to. I hope this book starts conversations where people can talk and listen and promote positive changes. This book argues with itself a few times, because I propose the idea that you can change your mind, and that's okay. This book is about talking and listening and loving and seeking truth and change.