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The voice was belittled. It was made small and delicate; it was modeled after its owner’s body.

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When you imagine an angry person, I’d be the last person you’d think of.

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You owe that to yourself, and you’ll also feel a lot more confident the more you do it.

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You have a right. To tell your story. To be heard. To be bold and fearless and unafraid.

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I tell her I’m scared a part of me will always hurt, that I think I’m a magnet to ruin, she asks me if there’s more. I tell her she should read more of my poetry to buy us more time for next week.

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The beauty is people in talking circles don’t have to like each other – and there’s no persuasion to agree or attempt at conversion. The only requirement is to show up and do your very best to see and hear one another.

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And in sifting through the myriad of voices, one thing became very clear: How and when you say something matters infinitely more than what you say as quickly as you can say it.

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When you decide to speak, rather than speaking because you feel obligated to clock-in on the #discourse, you’re doing it because you know you’ve got something to say.