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Niama Leslie Williams Ph.D.Heal the Soul: Trauma Survival and Creativity Enhancement Expert
Niama Leslie Williams Quick Facts
Main Areas: Trauma Survival, Creativity Training and Enhancement, Creative Writing, Literature
Career Focus: Author, Speaker, Professor of American Literature and Creative Writing, Business Owner Affiliation: Women for Hire, Onyx Woman, SistaTalk, Nothing Binding, Black Author Network ATTAINING THE FULLY IMAGINED LIFE Dr. Niama L. Williams, Workshop Facilitator
IT'S OKAY TO WANT: EROTICISM AND THE SURVIVAL OF SEXUAL TRAUMA
WORKSHOP FACILITATOR: DR. Niama L. Williams My work with survivors of sexual trauma is multifaceted. It begins with my speaking engagements and my literary ministry. I have a revolving repertoire of presentations that I do forthe general public ("Over 40, Over 400, and Facing the Future Fantastically"; "Attaining the Fully Imagined Life: The Inner Self/The Outer Self"; "The Four Boyfriends: Where Do YOU Stand in Your Relationships?"; "Blowing Up Barriers Take One: Hey, Why Can't I?"), and those presentations are safe places in which people can come forward and begin to share who they are.Within each of these presentations at some point I address the erotic energy, what it brings to creativity and to life, and what may or may not stifle release of the erotic energy. During that phase of the presentation I use selections from my own creative work, most of it erotically-charged literature, to present my own journey from inhibition as a survivor of sexual trauma to a free, liberated, accepting woman with a healthy and vibrant libido. At this point I briefly mention that I have workshops tailored for those stifled in all areas of their lives, including erotically, and invite those attending to contact me at a later time if they would like more information. The "Attaining the Fully Imagined Life"workshops are primarily for those stuck in terms of career and artistic endeavor; I have developed a special form of that workshop series which focuses on the survival of sexual trauma and the liberation or containment of the erotic energies (should they become excessive). Clients either work with me individually, or in groups of no more than eight. Whereas the AFIL workshops feature drawing as the principal icebreaker activity each week, responses to one of my pieces of erotic literature begin the discussions and are the precipitations of the at-home writing assignments each week. We proceed along the same outlines as the AFIL workshops: What is not working currently (the Muckraker and how do we kill him/her (Series A); what is our body, our soul, our consciousness telling us is wrong/needs fixing (Series B); what concrete steps, based on the answers achieved in series A and series B, are we going to take and show how it feels to be supported by the group as we take them (Series C). Niama’s special workshop series for sexual abuse survivors: "It's Okay to Want: Eroticism and Surviving Sexual Trauma." In Dr. Ni’s words: "I use my own literary work in these workshops because my erotic literature (novels, short stories, poems, memoir) tracks for survivors my own recovery and the many ways in which I give myself permission to be the liberated survivor that I am. Survivors want to see how it's done, to know that someone has gone before and made sure the water was fine." ###
BODY OF WORK
The soul’s voice, however, can be chaotic, so I’ve become comfortable with my work’s home between forms. I’ve become more fluid in my writing, more apt to let the words come as they are, flow as they want, wander and startle where they may. I have learned when and where and how to let go of control, and the proper place of editing. I let the initial spark carry everything forward, I write it all down as it streams in, and then I let it sit for three or four days so I can edit ruthlessly. If I can be patient, I let it sit a month, or at least three weeks, and edit again. After that revision, I try to put it somewhere and forget about it so that I can do that last edit with a no longer in mad love with it eye. That unforgiving eye is so important to honing the true beauty of the original inspiration.
Teasing out hidden beauty in the ordinary is always my goal, so my work is primarily for women. We think ourselves so commonplace, so ugly, so unfit. I write for women who’ve been abused, for women who have survived trauma, for women who have survived trauma and yet do some of the most complex, complicated jobs of the twenty-first century. Women who feed babies, who love husbands or partners while fighting the memory of an intrusion at four a.m. when they were three. Women who have to go to work in the midst of all this; women who face up to the demands and somehow, some way, keep from crumbling. My work is for these women so that they don’t crumble. It is my way of saying I’ve been there, I am there, I know, don’t give up, don’t throw in the towel, not today. Women can’t work, can’t change, can’t nurture or survive if they don’t want to get out of bed, if their trauma or struggles keep them from functioning.
I start with work if you ask me about artistic goals. An adjunct professor of English since 1993, I want the freedom an adjunct can only dream about. No scrambling for classes. No praying for enough assignments from enough colleges so that I can pay the bills. I am single with no husband or partner to provide a second income. One of my parents is deceased, and the other has notoriously bad credit. The only one who can support me now is me. The more classes I am forced by economics to teach, the less time I have to write poems, edit prose, submit essays, compile manuscripts; the less time I have to network, to create opportunities to read and present at conferences. I want time to focus on my writing, a gift any woman artist in this day and age would kill for.
You may ask about my audience, and I’ll tell you that I am a middle-aged Black woman with many female friends. My friends are in their twenties, thirties, forties, fifties, sixties and seventies. I think there is even an octogenarian in the mix. My friends are white, Black, Latino, Asian, Jewish and biracial. I have friends from college, and friends that I inherited from my deceased mother, women she had known since she was in junior high school.
These women and I talk about many things, and one discussion we have often circles around race and class and culture. We don’t step around the tension; we know that honest review of our experiences of each means that sometimes the white folks will be scared, and sometimes we will be scared. These women are my community; my Black femaleness only matters to them when it cements the authenticity with which I discuss whatever is pushing my pen forward at the moment. They know that as a self-aware and committed Black woman I cannot afford to add to the lies and half-truths we tell each other about race and class and culture in this country. To do so would be to do violence to my deepest and most profound sense of self.
My trauma was about secrets and pretending there was nothing wrong. To do so as an adult would betray the three and five and eight year old that I was. It would also do unspeakable violence to my community. My audience does not read me because I’m Black; they read me because I tell truths, because I put the unmentionable down on paper. One of my closest Black friends, who is also a writer, when she hears some of my pieces laughingly comments, “Niama, will you please stop scaring the white people?” She knows.
My community is unafraid of my boldness, my discussion of what lies beneath. They encourage that element of my work because they too are tired of walking on societal and cultural eggshells. They are relieved when I speak out on something they have held in for far too long.
I speak from my experience. My wide and varied community hears me. And that is the deepest and most profound connection. ### There are several ways to begin to find out who the illustrious Dr. Ni really is behind closed doors:
visit my website, http://www.blowingupbarriers.com; from the Welcome page onward you will learn the aims and ambitions of my company, Blowing Up Barriers Enterprises
visit my Lulu.com storefront and become familiar with the seven titles available for sale there; I have completed three novels, two of them memoir, each giving us a protagonist who is Black, female, second sighted and in peril; three collections of poetry, one dedicated to Hollywood stereotypes, one to the women who raised me and the women who raised them, and the last to people--famous and not so famous--who have touched my life and assisted me on my journey
request my Media Kit via the email address given on the "Contact Me" page of my company's website
or keep reading right here on SelfGrowth.com; book excerpts are only a few screens away!
### Dr. Niama L. Williams 484/231-1768 484/674-7804 (fax)
http://www.blowingupbarriers.com Recommended Experts and Friends
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