Resonance

This book, these words and photographs, are explorations of my self, my story; my emergence and becoming.

We are taught at an early age to ignore the messages of our bodies and emotions. We are told it doesn’t hurt, to smile when we are sad and to be calm when we are angry. We are taught to keep secrets with nowhere to go with pain and shame but within. Our bodies cry out but we don’t know to listen.

This is a profound and intimate invitation to explore with and beside An’ Marie and witness her courage to reconcile who she is and what has been done to her. Her story, told through sound, vision, prose, and color emphasize the size of the stain that sexual trauma leaves and also the scope for the recovery and healing of the human spirit. No pain inflicted is ours to own and no act so vile that we must accept it as our primal truth. Listen to the words of liberation in her work, each sound and syllable represents years of unspent tears. May your own rivers flow as you connect with her unpredictable yet resonant rhythm. This is life as art because art is both life and ugly but can be made beautiful in the words of the survivor. She is a survivor and she is in all of us.


Liz O’Donnell, PhD (LPCC-S, NCC, PT)


www.mindingmatters.com