Til inspiration har jeg nedenfor samlet en række citater om det at skrive, ytringsfriheden, og det at hele og udføre aktivisme igennem det skrevne ord.
Indtil videre har jeg valgt ikke at oversætte citaterne til dansk. Prøv evt. at bruge Google translate eller lign. hvis du ikke kan engelsk og har brug for en oversættelse. Vær dog opmærksom på at der ikke er 100% sikkerhed for at alle citaterne bliver oversat helt korrekt.
Så, hvorfor skrive?
When talk fails, writing speaks.
Seen on Redbubble
(not sure if this is the original source for this quote)
Through writing, we take action.
Jen Cross, Writing Ourselves Whole
Remember that anything you write can change lives. Writing is powerful, and its power goes beyond the act of publishing. What we write can impact others, even if it NEVER sees the book store or public internet. So if you write something that you’re not ready to publish, don’t feel ashamed of that. Instead, share it with a few close friends. Or read it aloud in a locked room to share it with yourself. It may impact you and others in ways you don’t expect.
Arcadia Page, I Can’t Help Being an INFP Writer: 100+ Tips to Help INFP Writers Capture Ideas
She looked me in the eye and I looked back. “It takes bravery to tell the truth. To write down what happened, to say it out loud. It’s how we understand each other. You’re a reader. You know how other people’s stories can change you.”
Daniella Mestyanek Young, Uncultured: A Memoir
I nodded, but I didn’t understand. People got money for being honest with their words? The only thing I’d ever seen come from the truth was punishment.
It takes heart and guts to tell the truth on the page, whether we ever share that writing with another soul. We grow, we transform, when we are willing to take that risk.
Jen Cross, Writing Ourselves Whole
For me, developing and sustaining a daily writing practice has been about learning to put on my own oxygen mask before I try to help anybody else. I know quite well what happens when I decide I don’t really need to write every day, or convince myself that I just don’t have the time: resentment builds up in me like a toxin. As soon as I sit down with my notebook and journal for twenty minutes, though—not necessarily writing about whatever’s bothering me in the moment, but describing the smell of the morning breeze, the sound of the birds, the colors of the morning light, what happened yesterday, last night’s dreams—my whole outlook shifts. I don’t know what makes this happen. It’s like an inner realignment, a rebooting and system recalibration.
Jen Cross, Writing Ourselves Whole
When we are willing to find language for the stories our bodies still hold, we can gain greater control over those traumatic memories. We create a place and a container into which to release these stories of loss and shame and horror and grief—as well as a place to honor our survival.
Jen Cross, Writing Ourselves Whole
This, of course, is one of the reasons these proscriptions around certain topics of conversation exist—not talking about it furthers a survivor’s sense of isolation and disconnection. A disconnected and fragmented people are a more easily divided and controlled people. When we speak out, when we share our true and messy, real life stories, we do our part to undermine our own and others’ isolation, and to undermine the conditions for further violence to occur.
Jen Cross, Writing Ourselves Whole
When we write and share our silenced and secreted experiences, often someone looks at us with surprise and says, Me, too. Two isolations are disrupted in that moment.
We can have a lot of fun writing about sex! It’s hot, it makes us flush with how defiant we are, and we witness our prowess: What kind of woman says things like that? What kind of man is so vulnerable?
…
Writing about sex reminds us that we are, by birthright, erotic, sensual, sensuous beings.
…
It doesn’t matter if anyone else finds your erotic writing sexy or hot: others’ perceptions of what is or is not erotic ought not to be the focus when you’re struggling to access the language, the metaphor, of your own erotic. What matters is that you begin to become thickly aware of your own juices, your own unguent self.
Jen Cross, Writing Ourselves Whole
I often feel fear when I’m writing. I may be afraid of feeling nauseous or triggered after writing. I may be afraid I’m not competent enough a writer to do justice to the story I want to tell. Or I may be writing something I was never supposed to speak of—there may be a psychic response rising up in me, protective ghosts trying to move my pen off the page: don’t say that; you’ll get us hurt if you say that. I’m still afraid he’ll come after me if I tell.
Jen Cross, Writing Ourselves Whole
If I’m afraid as I write, I can stop writing if I choose to. But being afraid doesn’t mean I have to stop writing.
We want to keep the trauma locked up in a ward behind our eyes. We think we are safer that way, silent. But maybe you already know what Audre Lorde, in her book Sister/Outsider, said about safety and silence: “I was going to die, if not sooner then later, whether or not I had ever spoken myself. My silences had not protected me. Your silence will not protect you.”
Jen Cross, Writing Ourselves Whole
Writing can be a way to find a way to be real and sane in the world, even if it feels a little crazy while you’re doing it.
Jen Cross, Writing Ourselves Whole
Someone said, if we don’t tell our stories, others will tell them for us, and they will get them wrong. The stories that the others tell about you will be used to build policy and pathology, will be used to build boxes to hide you in, used to build walls to close around you, used against you. If we do not tell our stories, the stories told about us will be used to our detriment.
Jen Cross, Writing Ourselves Whole
Words help change the world. Use your words to evoke change.
…
Think of your favorite author. Think of the books that made you infuriated. Think of the books that made you cry. Think of the books that changed your world, the books that changed you, and how you were different because you read them.You have the ability to do this too with your words, with your stories. This is why your voice is important.
Rachel Giesel, Why Your Voice Matters NOW
https://rachelgieselgrimm.com/blog/your-voice-matters
YOUR VOICE MATTERS.
Use it. Own it. Be the change you wish to see in the world. Do it, through your very special and powerful words. Recognize your voice. Be loud, be proud, be unapologetically you. Realize that it’s hard and scary to use your voice, but consciously choose to do it anyway. Speak your truths. Write the stories that make sense for you.
Rachel Giesel, Why Your Voice Matters NOW
https://rachelgieselgrimm.com/blog/your-voice-matters
Sharing your lived experience of fundamentalism, warts & all, isn’t “antisemitic,” “Islamophobic,” “anti-Christians,” etc. You have a right to tell your story—be it in service of healing, connection, activism. Those who try to silence you can’t handle your (& often their) truth.
Pesach Eisen on Twitter
https://web.archive.org/web/20220419013218/https://twitter.com/pesachology/status/1516228041420288004
In liberating yourself from fundamentalism, you are essentially liberating future generations whom you influence. Tell your story. It could save a life.
Janice Selbie
https://web.archive.org/web/20200303162035/https://twitter.com/Wise_counsellor/status/1234856118322638849
Make people hate you.
Okay, this one needs some explanation. When I first started out blogging five years ago, one of the most golden pieces of advice I received was to never try to please everyone with your writing.
The best creators are polarizing. They have a strong voice and their opinions rub some people the wrong way. But the right people identify so deeply with your work that they feel an emotional, often life-changing, connection to you.Michaela, Introvert Spring
So, yeah, if you want to connect on an emotional level with the right people, sometimes you’ll have to piss the wrong people off. Being an introverted baddass means sharing your authentic voice, even if that voice goes against the grain—especially if it does!
You’re okay with not being the nice guy who runs himself ragged just to make others happy. Or the nice girl who never shares her true opinions for fear that she’ll offend someone.
https://introvertspring.com/how-to-be-an-introverted-boss/
Life is too short to be the secure, unbothered, cool girl. Voice your emotions. Voice your anger. Live your truth.
Gigi Engle
https://www.instagram.com/p/DE4sshIALRn
https://www.threads.net/@gigiengle/post/DE4s1mOgiUl
Acknowledging reality is not a “betrayal” of anybody– although your trauma conditioning may try to frame telling your story as a “betrayal” of your family, church, etc.
But denying a painful reality IS a betrayal– of yourself.Dr. Glenn Patrick Doyle
Don’t collude w/ “them” in betraying you.
https://bsky.app/profile/drdoylesays.bsky.social/post/3ks3zigawd225
You do not need to bend over backwards to protect the feelings or reputation of a person or church that spent years making you feel like garbage.
Dr. Glenn Patrick Doyle
Putting words to our pain is often an important part of healing– & you get to express exactly what your experience was.
https://bsky.app/profile/drdoylesays.bsky.social/post/3kv5esimwuk25
No doubt. Telling our story often comes at a cost.
Sometimes that cost is social. Sometimes it’s potentially legal or financial. Very often it’s emotional– or even physical.Dr. Glenn Patrick Doyle
You get to choose whether, when, & why that price is worth paying. ONLY you.
https://x.com/DrDoyleSays/status/1718100283719368911
Enduring trauma makes us feel like we CAN’T communicate, no matter how hard we try– like we don’t have the words, & if we TRY to communicate, we’ll end up making things worse or feeling stupid or weird or bad.
Yeah. Breaking that silence feels scary– for everyone.Dr. Glenn Patrick Doyle
Breathe.
https://x.com/DrDoyleSays/status/1690739988647055360
Bookend your day w/ writing. It doesn’t matter if it’s rambly, or cranky, or if you feel like you don’t have anything to say. Writing morning & night changes our brain.
Dr. Glenn Patrick Doyle
Reading & writing every day can drastically cut the lag time in becoming who we wanna become.
https://bsky.app/profile/drdoylesays.bsky.social/post/3kygdvldbop2n
Tell your story. Be truthful. But tell your story.
Rebecca Lujan Loveless
And for fuck’s sake don’t let others dictate what you tell or how much detail you share. Telling your story is a tool for healing. It yanks lies from their dark caves & exposes what was hidden & shameful to the light of day.
https://x.com/rlujanloveless/status/1160175909074161665
hey. slow progress is still progress. in your writing project AND in your recovery. deep breath. we’re okay. 🖤
Megan
https://bsky.app/profile/writemeganwrite.bsky.social/post/3kea5ve5ilk23