femminista: thoughts of a feminist rhetorician

Struggling towards what, you ask. I'm not sure how to answer that question. One- I am struggling towards speaking in a public forum about all of the amazing changes that have happened in my life. I want to share them because I believe that they might be of value to others. I fear sharing them because of those people who, for whatever reason, feel the need to devalue and disparage things spoken from the heart. Two- where do I draw the line between my public life and my private life? I'm not one for secrecy. As a friend of mine recently, and quite aptly, pointed out: I am a "full-disclosure kind of girl." It's true that I find great value in openness and that closing myself off is what I can only describe as unnatural for me. Moreover, closing myself off is painful to me, while opeing myself is beyond liberatory. It would then seem that my choice should be simple. Unfortunately, I seem to be as drawn to the complicated as much as I am drawn to truth. And I do not live in a vacuum. My life is woven through and within the lives of others and while I may find liberation in openness, they may find comfort in privacy. Regardless, it is not my place to decide their level of comfort with disclosure. Certainly, I could use pseudonyms or other methods of shielding identities, but that too seems unfair. But I am again and again compelled to speak from my heart and strip away the barriers that keep people isolated and unhappy. My solution, for the moment, is to attempt to share judiciously and with the best of intentions and hope that I do not, in the process, pave my road to hell.