Stories Episodes

“You have to be able to look for the gems that are in the darkness, that something to hold on to that will give you some kind of hope. It doesn't have to be anything big, but just even one thing that you can hold on to that gives you hope.” – Diana Colleen

“If you could imagine an entire country whose mental illnesses are untreated and their addictions to drugs and alcohol are running rampant in the streets, our society has improved a wee bit. However, it does make for some fun times looking back.” – Laura Van Wormer

“We don't get curious about ourselves and go, oh, that's interesting. Why do I do that? Why do I have this belief? Why do I have this pattern or this behavior? And I think when we start questioning that, and we start questioning that lens, like a whole different world opens up.” – Bridget Budd

“People are more alike than different. The more conversations I have, the more I realize we have the same fears. We have similar hopes. And, you know, we just want to make a difference, and we want the world to be a better place.” – Candice Snyder

“When you write something, when you compose something, when you paint something it’s such a deep inner process for the creator himself or herself that I think it's always a process of working with your own being and discovering things about your own being, and healing some issues in yourself.” – Chris Nielsen

“It's amazing how everything scaffolds on top, all the skills scaffold on top. You still have to stay current, but all of that has just been a wonderful foundation.” – Jean Burgess, PhD

"There's no expiration date on reinventing yourself." – Kirsten Telan

“Language is powerful in terms of how we describe things, and if we don't have any positive words, it's really hard to talk about it in a positive way that can help reshape how people are thinking about it.” – Dr. Corinne Auman

“Whatever genre you want to write in, whatever you want to do. Your art is important, and it deserves to exist in the world.” – Amy Lou Jenkins

“We just felt like, you know what? If we don't do it now, we're never going to do it because too many people wait until they get older and then they never end up leaving.” – Alison Gieschen

“Your thoughts create your life.” – Lisa B. Schermerhorn

“Imagine it's your last day on Earth. What song would you write?“ – Greig Watts

“So many people live in the past as if there's going to be a do over, or as if they're like the phone we use where we watch a video, and it's got that little button that says you can go back 10 seconds. That's not how life is. And when we're hanging out in the past, we're missing what's happening in the present.” – Tom LeNoble

“One thing I try to do in all of my novels, no matter how serious they are, I like to have comic relief. I like to have the reader smile and go, ‘oh, that's funny’.” – Adele Royce

“As I unpacked that with them in their interviews, some of them came to tears because something that is so personal and what some people discounted outside of the walls as something emotional, actually had value and meaning outside of the walls of that church and into very hard-hitting corporate America.” – L. Michelle Smith

“I never forgot that. That was asked of me in July of 1971. I had just left medical school. I was in Ohio. I was one of 35 doctors, but I was the only black doctor, and I was asked that question. And so how do you how do you forget that?” – Dr. Otto E. Stallworth Jr.

“Get comfortable being a little uncomfortable and raise your hand and say, yes, and you'll be amazed you do those two things of where life can take you.” – Alex Boylan

“There is a reason why I'm writing her story. So, I gave myself permission to write her story to get all these feelings out of me. And once I gave myself permission to do that, I did not stop writing.” – Laura Frost

“You deserve to be treated with kindness, and it starts by first being kind to yourself.” – Rosie Aiello

“It's always important to speak up for yourself and to define for yourself what you will and will not tolerate.” – Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum

“Beauty truly does come from within…and a glow can't be purchased.” – Liane Marie Lambert

“At the same time in which, he kind of like crushed my dream a little bit. He gave me permission to dream a new one, a different one, which in the end, looking back five, six years later, I appreciate.” – Regina Linke

“Even if it doesn't mean anything to you, it means something to the person that you're writing for, and it means something to the person who's reading the story.” – Dr. Rhonda M. Lawson

“It just takes a different mindset and a different approach and a different way of saying yes to yourself…I learned to say yes to myself and say, give it a chance. See what happens.” – Heike Yates