Even as my family fell apart and things were at their most hopeless, my dad and I found a lot of happiness in the wilderness - sleeping on the cold gravel and killing as many things as we could get… — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
My mom was a social worker. I had a pretty good idea of what the authorities can do when a parent's not around. — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
Resisting and avoiding pain sucks energy-and time. The more you let yourself feel those minute-and-a-half hells, the quicker you'll start feeling those minute-and-a-half happinesses. — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
“Pain only seems scary while you're waiting for it to happen. After it does, it's just hurt and recovery.” — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
I turned what was a wonderful case of self-reliance into a case of self-exile. Which is not uncommon, I think, in people who grow… — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
I wasn't in a position that some other memoirists are, dealing with families who fed them meth, or kidnapped them, or did something that would make the writer not want to see that family again. I wanted to see my family. I wanted to celebrate them. I was proud of who we were, in the wilderness, floating down rapids or… — Leigh Newman Copy Share
It feels like people talk a lot, in their relationships and in therapy. But my family wasn't like that. My dad wasn't and I… — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
The minute I landed back in Alaska, it was back to hip boots and fish guts. This cultural flipping wasn't easy - especially on… — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
Often, I think that my brothers were the reason I didn't do something really stupid in my teenage years; I didn't want to disappoint… — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
My natural inclination is to think in scenes. So that's how I write, and the issue for me is usually: what to compress for… — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
The tough thing is how to cultivate a life where the paramecium of happiness gets a lot of chances to get out and swim… — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
There's a kind of intimacy that happens between a mother and an only child. Which only gets more intimate when it's between a mother… — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
My dad felt pretty strongly that I know about the basic workings of a plane and so he taught me how to read and… — Leigh Newman Copy Share Image
Penning an advice column for the literary website The Rumpus, [Strayed] worked anonymously, using the pen name Sugar, replying to letters from readings suffering everything from loveless marriages to abusive, drug-addicted brothers to disfiguring illnesses. The result: intimate, in-depth essays that not only took the letter writer's life into account but also Strayed's. Collected in a book, they make for… — Leigh Newman Copy Share
