Where There's Hope: Healing, Moving Forward, and Never Giving Up - Softcover

Smart

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1250115531 ISBN 13: 9781250115539

Verlag: Griffin, 2019

Inhaltsangabe

Elizabeth Smart follows up her #1 New York Times bestseller (October 2013), My Story-about being held in captivity as a teenager, and how she managed to survive-with a powerful and inspiring book about what it takes to overcome trauma, find the strength to move on, and reclaim one's life.

Author. Activist. Victim-no more.

In her fearless memoir, My Story-the basis of the Lifetime Original movie I Am Elizabeth Smart-Elizabeth detailed, for the first time, the horror behind the headlines of her abduction by religious fanatic Brian David Mitchell and his wife, Wanda Barzee. Since then, she's married, become a mother, and travelled the world as the president of the Elizabeth Smart Foundation, sharing her story with the intent of helping others along the way.

Over and over, Elizabeth is asked the same question: How do you find the hope to go on? In this book, Elizabeth returns to the horrific experiences she endured, and the hard-won lessons she learned, to provide answers. She also calls upon others who have dealt with adversity-victims of violence, disease, war, and loss-to explore the pathways toward hope. Through conversations with such well-known voices as Anne Romney, Diane von Furstenburg, and Mandy Patinkin to spiritual leaders Archbishop John C. Wester and Elder Richard Hinckley to her own parents, Elizabeth uncovers an even greater sense of solace and understanding. Where There's Hope is the result of Elizabeth's mission: It is both an up-close-and-personal glimpse into her healing process and a heartfelt how-to guide for readers to make peace with the past and embrace the future.

From the book:
"I was not willing to accept that my fate was to live unhappily ever after. Everything-my family, my home, my chance to go to school-had been given back to me, and I didn't want to miss a second chance of living my own life." -Elizabeth Smart

"There are two types of survivors: the ones who did not die, and the ones who live. There will be those who will always remember and be the victim, and ones who just won't. You have to go on, you have to learn, and you have to heal." -Diane von Furstenberg

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

ELIZABETH SMART is an American activist and president of the Elizabeth Smart Foundation. She first gained widespread attention at age fourteen when she was kidnapped from her home and rescued nine months later. Smart's #1 New York Times bestselling memoir My Story describes her experience, and her follow-up, Where There's Hope, is an inspiring guide to healing after trauma.

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Where There's Hope

Healing, Moving Forward, and Never Giving Up

By Elizabeth Smart

St. Martin's Press

Copyright © 2018 Elizabeth Smart
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-250-11553-9

Contents

Title Page, 
Copyright Notice, 
Dedication, 
Preface, 
1. Hope Empowered Mom; Ann Romney, 
2. Forward at All Costs — Never Retreat Bre Lasley; Mary Louise Zeller, 
3. Seeing a Rush of Red Norma Bastidas, 
4. Loss and Renewal Rebecca Covey, 
5. The Sacredness of Faith Fatima; Elder Richard G. Hinckley, 
6. Strength of Spirit Diane von Furstenberg; Mariatu Kamara, 
7. Our Physical Gift Lara Oles; Helen Golden, 
8. Building a Life of Love Angeline Jackson, 
9. The Power to Forgive Chris Williams; Archbishop John C. Wester, 
10. Something Worth Striving For Mike Schlappi; Nicole Brady, 
11. Living with a Purpose Alec Unsicker; Dr. Paul Jenkins, 
12. The Myth versus the Reality of Happily Ever After Dad; Mandy Patinkin, 
Afterword, 
Contributors, 
Acknowledgments, 
Also by Elizabeth Smart, 
About the Author, 
Copyright, 

CHAPTER 1

Hope Empowered

"Hope" is the thing with feathers-– That perches in the soul-– And sings the tune without the words-– And never stops-–at all ... —

Emily Dickinson

My mom will always love me, no matter what has happened to me. My dad will always love me. My siblings are stuck with me. No matter what happens to me, my family will always love me, and that is something that can never be taken away from me. That was my thought the morning after I was kidnapped from my bed at knifepoint and brought high into the mountains behind my childhood home.

I grew up in Salt Lake City, where my family has been for generations. My father, Ed Smart, was in real estate, and my mother, Lois, was a homemaker. Right up until the day I disappeared, I probably would have said that there was nothing remarkable about my parents. They were just Mom and Dad, two kind, quiet-living, salt-of-the-earth people who were devoted to each other and to their children.

I come from a large family, the second of six kids. Although we all look alike — different variations of the same mold, fair-skinned and athletic — we are all different. But whenever we get together, there's teasing, laughing, and long conversations.

My brother Charles is the oldest and used to want everyone to know that, but he's also highly dedicated and fiercely loyal to those he loves.

I'm next, so for the first fourteen years of my life, teachers and kids in the school halls would always say, "You look just like your older brother!" (Ah, if only I were occasionally recognized now as Charles's sister instead of as "that girl who got kidnapped.")

Andrew follows me. Everyone likes Andrew. He is impossible not to like, making friends wherever he goes. When Andrew was a little boy, probably only about two years old, Mom had taken us shopping, and there was a lady standing outside the store smoking a cigarette. Without missing a beat, Andrew said to her, "Smoking is bad for you!" I think my mom died inside a little bit, and she quickly herded us into the store. When we were returning to the car with our groceries, the lady ran up to us and said to Andrew, "That was my last cigarette. I'll never smoke again." Whether it was his boyish charm or his sweet face, I don't know, but he got away with that sort of stunt then and still does now.

My only sister, Mary Katherine, is next. She is the kind of person who may seem quiet, even reserved, but once you gain her trust, you will have a loyal friend for life. We shared a room for almost our entire childhood. We were best pals. Being outnumbered two to one by boys, Mary Katherine and I had to stick together. Sometimes we would stay up late after our parents sent us to bed, just giggling until our dad would come in and tell us, "Girls, go to sleep. Now."

Edward is disciplined and serious. He's always known what he wanted and how to get it, and he has a million-dollar smile that tells you everything you need to know about him.

William is the baby of the family. Even though there are exactly eleven years and six days between us, we have always been close. When he was a little boy and would get scared at night, he would come into the room my sister and I shared and crawl into bed with us. I don't think Mary Katherine was too keen on that, but I would tell her, "One day he'll grow up, and he will never do this again, and then you'll miss it."

On June 4, 2002, I was fourteen years old, just about to graduate from junior high, and I couldn't wait to go to high school. I was sick of the dress code and riding the bus, and I was really looking forward to the alternating day class schedules. I was an intelligent kid, but I was very sheltered. Whenever I heard about kidnappings, rapes, or other crimes committed against people, I naïvely thought those things could never happen to me. They could happen to other people — people who lived on the wrong side of the tracks or made questionable decisions — but certainly never me. My innocence made my experience all the worse, because all the things that I thought could never happen to me did happen — along with a lot of things I could never have imagined happening to anyone at all.

In the early hours of that morning, I woke up with a sharp knife blade pressed up against my neck. A bearded man stood over me. He said, "I have a knife at your neck. Don't make a sound. Get up and come with me." This terrifying person dragged me out of my bed and steered me out of the house, threatening to kill my little sister if I didn't cooperate. I remember being led through my house and up into the mountains, praying every step of the way for an opportunity to escape, feeling scared that somehow I had missed that opportunity, sobbing, "Why? Why are you doing this?"

He said something about ransom. That I was his hostage. He told me to be quiet or he'd go back into my house and kill my family, and I believed him. He'd just demonstrated that he could do exactly that. He forced me to hike up into the trees a couple hundred yards down from the mountain ridgeline. There in the heart of the forest was a clearing. Part of the mountainside had been leveled out. On the south side of the camp, a retaining wall had been built up with branches and trees interwoven almost like a basket but not as tight. There was a large tent — maybe a six-person-sized tent. Tarps covered the ground around the tent and hung from the trees above, hiding the camp from view. I saw big plastic trunks, filled with I have no idea what. Behind the tent, there was a big hole in the ground, but it was mostly covered up with logs laid across the top and dirt thrown on top of the logs. A piece of skinny metal cable ran through the camp. It was tied around a tree on the west side and lashed to another tree on the east side.

A woman emerged from the tent. This image is seared into my memory. She was unlike any person I had ever seen before. She had long gray hair and hard, cold eyes that bored into me. She had a thickly built body and wore a long linen robe. She immediately embraced me in a very threatening way — like she was trying to tell me, I'm in control. If you cross me, you'll be sorry. She led me into the tent and sat me down on an upturned bucket. She brought in a small blue basin to give me a sponge bath. I was very shy, so I was appalled at the idea of anyone...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Griffin
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2019
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1250115531
• ISBN 13: 9781250115539
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 283
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: gpsr@libri.de; gpsr@libri.de; ; Friedensallee 273; Hamburg; 22763; Deutschland