Last weekend Bainbridge Island’s environmental learning center, Islandwood, hosted New York Times best selling author Cheryl Strayed. If you don’t know Cheryl, she hiked the Pacific Coast Trail in 1995 from the junction in the Mojave Desert to the Bridge of the Gods spanning the Columbia River at the Oregon-Washington border. She hiked alone in boots that didn’t fit properly. She documented the experience in her best seller Wild, the book that Oprah introduced to reignite Oprah’s Book Club 2.0. The movie with Reese Witherspoon will be released fall 2014. More than one hundred women from across the United States and Canada attended the weekend conference. Please know that Islandwood is nature’s most magical campus, adding immense dimension to the captivating weekend escape. I was privileged to be part of the party.

Back to Cheryl…She’s an amazing speaker, drawing you in as if you were a good friend and sharing an intimate conversation for the first time. Nothing was held back. She speaks from the heart with truth and vulnerability. She speaks of forgiveness and healing and the need to surrender to our losses. When asked, “How do you open your heart so wide?” She said, “I am not afraid to talk about my life.” She spoke of self-examination: What’s true? What’s truer? What’s the truest thing? When questioned- “How do you know your life’s purpose?” Her answer was simple. “Get rid of all the outside voices. Listen to your voice. You have to try to offer up the best thing you can. You must give the best of yourself.” Her words resonated with me as if they were my own.

I wanted to share this experience because it validated something deep inside me; that is, how I write. I write with vulnerability, sometimes too true, sometimes too raw, certainly to the point and without the extras. Some people in the business say my style is too honest. But Cheryl’s words validated my writing: “Write the truest thing you can write.” Living every moment with honest gumption is how I want to live, just like Cheryl Strayed.

I’ll leave you with two quotes that summed up the weekend:

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? - Mary Oliver

People will forget what you said. People will forget what you did. But people will never forget how you made them feel. -Maya Angelou