To be in touch with senses and emotions beyond conquest is to enter the realm of the mysterious. - bell hooks

Shame about being hurt often has its origin in childhood. And it is then that many of us first learn that it is a virtue to be silent about pain. … As more people have found the courage to break through shame and speak about woundedness in their lives, we are now subjected to a mean-spirited cultural response, where all talk of woundedness is mocked. The belittling of anyone’s attempt to make a context within which they were wounded, were made a victim, is a form of shaming.

To build community requires vigilant awareness of the work we must continually do to undermine all the socialization that leads us to behave in ways that perpetuate domination.

To indoctrinate boys into the rules of patriarchy, we force them to feel pain and to deny their feelings.