If you’ve read my latest book, Your Turn, you know that I write a great deal about some of my personal struggles with mental health, addiction and a very pertinent topic at this time period in American society, eating disorders. It’s National Eating Disorders Awareness Week from Feb. 24- March 1, and there’s no better time to talk about this vital, yet largely underreported, topic than now. The theme for this year’s National Eating Disorders Awareness Week is “Come as You Are: Hindsight is … [Read more...]
An Interview: My Journey as a Recovering Addict and the Power of Storytelling
I recently had the privilege of talking with Thrive Global about my journey as an author, educator and recovering addict (“F.A.T.E From Addict to Entrepreneur With Dr. Tyra Manning Author of “Your Turn” And Michael G. Dash”). The interview Q&A was a great way to help launch my latest book, Your Turn: Ways to Celebrate Life Through Storytelling, at the beginning of October. This was a candid and long-form interview in which I discussed overcoming addiction at length. Although that … [Read more...]
Music Memories: Ripple
It was about 25 years ago when I first became acquainted with the music of the Grateful Dead. Unlike many of the other rock bands or mainstream music acts I’d grown to know and love in the 50s, 60s and 70s, the music of the Grateful Dead always had seemed somehow different and less accessible to me. Ironically, my first true introduction to the band came later in my life through my daughter Laura. During that period, I was the new superintendent of a public school in Illinois, and she was … [Read more...]
The Gift of Freedom from Addictions
Even despite 36 years of sobriety, it’s impossible for me to take my freedom from addiction for granted. As someone who struggled for years with alcohol addiction, my heart truly aches for the millions of people who continue to face addictions in all their forms. The sad truth is that each generation faces its own addiction crisis, the most recent being the widespread epidemic of opioid drug abuse in our country. According to The New York Times, in 2015 alone, nearly 33,000 Americans died in … [Read more...]
Storytelling and Life Lessons: Writing to Heal
For many of us, our most memorable stories come from family folklore. These are the stories that inform us about who we are and where we came from. We’ve either lived these moments or had them passed down from other generations, and have filed them in our memory boxes marked, Important Life Lessons. These lessons can be drawn upon throughout our lives, whether we are seven or 70. My very best and earliest storytelling teachers were Ida Mae, my next-door neighbor, and my grandfather, … [Read more...]
