Showstopper Episodes

“I've always had a voice, and I finally came into my own. And I've got my voice. And I love giving other people a voice.” – Adrienne Barker

“As long as there's life, there's hope.” – Martha Hoy

“I'm not a writer, but you don't have to be a writer to create a really wonderful book.” – Christine Blosdale

"My past can explain me, but I'm not going to let it define me." – Kevin “KAYR” Robinson

“Your story is worth it.” – Sheekha Singh

“We don't get curious about ourselves and go, oh, that's interesting. Why do I do that? Why do I have this belief? Why do I have this pattern or this behavior? And I think when we start questioning that, and we start questioning that lens, like a whole different world opens up.” – Bridget Budd

“People are more alike than different. The more conversations I have, the more I realize we have the same fears. We have similar hopes. And, you know, we just want to make a difference, and we want the world to be a better place.” – Candice Snyder

"There's no expiration date on reinventing yourself." – Kirsten Telan

“Language is powerful in terms of how we describe things, and if we don't have any positive words, it's really hard to talk about it in a positive way that can help reshape how people are thinking about it.” – Dr. Corinne Auman

“Whatever genre you want to write in, whatever you want to do. Your art is important, and it deserves to exist in the world.” – Amy Lou Jenkins

“Your thoughts create your life.” – Lisa B. Schermerhorn

“Imagine it's your last day on Earth. What song would you write?“ – Greig Watts

“I had written before, and I would stop. Either life would get in the way or my own perfectionist tendencies. So, I just made the intention that I'm not going to stop. I'm going to finish this whether it gets published or not.” – Lori Zoss

“So many people live in the past as if there's going to be a do over, or as if they're like the phone we use where we watch a video, and it's got that little button that says you can go back 10 seconds. That's not how life is. And when we're hanging out in the past, we're missing what's happening in the present.” – Tom LeNoble

“One thing I try to do in all of my novels, no matter how serious they are, I like to have comic relief. I like to have the reader smile and go, ‘oh, that's funny’.” – Adele Royce

“As I unpacked that with them in their interviews, some of them came to tears because something that is so personal and what some people discounted outside of the walls as something emotional, actually had value and meaning outside of the walls of that church and into very hard-hitting corporate America.” – L. Michelle Smith

“I never forgot that. That was asked of me in July of 1971. I had just left medical school. I was in Ohio. I was one of 35 doctors, but I was the only black doctor, and I was asked that question. And so how do you how do you forget that?” – Dr. Otto E. Stallworth Jr.

“Get comfortable being a little uncomfortable and raise your hand and say, yes, and you'll be amazed you do those two things of where life can take you.” – Alex Boylan

“Confidence is a skill, and you build it from the inside out.” – Simone Knego

“There is a reason why I'm writing her story. So, I gave myself permission to write her story to get all these feelings out of me. And once I gave myself permission to do that, I did not stop writing.” – Laura Frost

“If you don't quit, you never lose.” – Dr. Tommy Rhee

“Don't let the metrics and all the followers kind of get you down. If you can help one person today, make them smile, solve a problem, or make them understand that they are loved and appreciated. You've done your job for today.” – Allen C. Paul

“It's always important to speak up for yourself and to define for yourself what you will and will not tolerate.” – Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum

“There's a difference between breathing and living. Everybody will breathe, but not everybody will live. Everybody will exist, but not everybody will live.” – Dr. Kevin Foreman