The Bookshop Podcast
The Bookshop Podcast
Ancestral Echoes: Navigating Intergenerational Trauma and the Art of Memoir Writing with Diana Raab
In this episode, I chat with Diana Raab, MFA, PhD, about writing, intergenerational trauma, the art of writing memoir, and her new book, Hummingbird: Messages from My Ancestors, A memoir with reflection and writing prompts .
Diana is a memoirist, poet, workshop leader, thought-leader and award-winning author of fourteen books. Her work has been widely published and anthologized. She frequently speaks and writes on writing for healing and transformation.
Raab blogs for Psychology Today, The Wisdom Daily, The Good Men Project, Thrive Global, and is a guest blogger for many others. Visit her at: https:/www.dianaraab.com.
Raab lives in Southern California.
Hummingbird: Messages from my Ancestors, Diana Raab
Gen Z Information:
Talk With Zach (Zach Gottlieb)
Dr. Yalda T. Uhls, Founder Center For Scholars & Storytellers
Gen Z For Change
Books by Thich Nhat Hanh
One Long River, Brian Doyle
Hi, my name is Mandy Jackson-Bevillie. Welcome to the Bookshop podcast. Each week, I present interviews with independent Bookshop owners from around the globe, authors, publishing professionals and specialists in subjects dear to my heart the environment and social justice. To help the show reach more people, please share it with friends and family and on social media, and remember to subscribe and leave a review wherever you listen to this podcast. You're listening to Episode 235. Before I begin this week's interview, I'd like to give a shout out to Foster Haney at Century Coffee in Ventura, california. Foster, thank you so much for the delicious bag of decaf. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Diana Rab is a memoirist, poet, essayist, thought leader and speaker. She presents workshops in writing for healing and transformation. She has a PhD in psychology with a concentration in transpersonal psychology, with a research focus on the healing and transformative powers of memoir writing. Her educational background also includes health administration, nursing and creative writing. Diana has been writing since an early age. As an early child of two immigrant parents, she spent a lot of time crafting letters and chronicling her life in a journal. As an advocate of personal writing, diana facilitates workshops in writing for transformation and empowerment, focusing on journaling, poetry and memoir writing. She believes in the importance of writing to achieve wholeness and interconnectedness, while encouraging the ability to unleash the true voice of the inner self. Hi, diana, and welcome to the show. It's great to have you here.
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm so thrilled to be here. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1:It's my pleasure. Let's begin with learning about you, your early childhood writing and what led you from nursing to a career in writing.
Speaker 2:Ah, thank you for asking. Well, my writing career began really at an early age. I think I was seven when my parents sent me to sleep away camp and gave me a big box of stationery instead of right home every day. My parents were immigrants to Mira and my grandmother was my caretaker when I was 10 years old. She had taken her life and my childhood home. It wasn't dramatic, it was an overdose of sleeping pills, but I'm the one who found her.
Speaker 2:My mother really it was 60s had no idea what to do, but she did wisely. Little did she know it would be the big board of my writing life, but she went out and bought me a Cahill Gibran journal. She told me to write down my feelings, write letters to my grandma, because we were so close, grandma and I did, and I realized at a very early age that writing healed. In fact, I would love writing so much that I gathered the neighborhood children. I don't think I mentioned this in the book, I can't recall, but I gathered the neighborhood children in the yard to teach them how to journal because I wanted to share the joy. And I'm still doing that. You know, I do believe that your passions begin in childhood.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that little seed starts to grow at an early age. And when did nursing come into your life?
Speaker 2:Well, I've always kind of. I guess I came from my I don't want to call you know, they use these fancy words of you know the troubled homes. And I didn't really have a troubled home, it's just there was a lot of chaos of the parents working and the challenges of being immigrants back then, and so I found my. I ended up being kind of like a family healer. I would say I would kind of. My parents were fighting, I was the one that came between and I was a mediator. My grandparents were fighting. So I think from an early age I was a healer and from an early age of writer as well. And so the writing. I became editor of the high school newspaper. I have difficult pregnancies. I wrote difficult pregnancy books.
Speaker 2:And when did I decide to go to nursing? I think I was doing my undergraduate work and I was sitting strangely how things happen in life. I was sitting outside the library and I had an undecided major and this girl came up to me and she said you know, I'm in the healthcare program and it was so great. I'm like, okay, I'll try that. I tried it and I loved learning about the body and then, as time went on, I realized I loved it so much. When I go to nursing school, my path has always been kind of going with a flow of what feels right and it kind of fed into my healing, my need for healing others In listening to you speak.
Speaker 1:I have another question when did your parents immigrate from?
Speaker 2:My mother was from Austria, my father was from Germany, and it was in 1939. And so they came to New York, and you know, I heard Germans spoken in the home all the time and it was challenging times for them.
Speaker 1:And did they know each other prior to arriving in the States?
Speaker 2:Actually no, they met in New York at a dance hall.
Speaker 1:Oh, I love that story. That's wonderful. Let's talk about your new book Coming Bird a Memoir Messages for my Ancestors. In it you write about inherited suffering In one of your grandmother's journal entries on page 72, she writes about her mother's death and being at the mortuary wondering if her mother is there. So we have her looking for her dead mother and later you, as a child, finding your grandmother dead. Can you expand on this concept of inherited suffering and its twin, ancestral or intergenerational healing?
Speaker 2:Sure. Well, you know, everything starts when we're born. Actually, everything starts before we're born, and so how our grandparents and our parents dealt with life really has an impact on us. Intergenerational trauma often happens when someone in the family is traumatized and I think the body remembers, the DNA remembers. It's not so much that the DNA gets altered, but it guides how the genes become activated. I always say, especially when I'm teaching my memoir students to write their books, I always say it's not so much what happened to you, but it's how you reacted to it. You know, you could have the same experience as a sibling and both of you would react totally different. One way to heal into generational trauma really is to connect with your ancestors. And, by the way, when I talk about ancestors in my book, it's not just family. It could be mentors, it could be loved ones, it could be friends, it could be places you know that have inspired you, and so it's all about connecting with those ancestors to look for the answers that would help you heal and finding support during that process.
Speaker 1:And I'd like to add something, and that is when we discover issues or circumstances in our mothers or fathers' lives that they have inherited, we then have the ability to figure out where that suffering has come from and actually kind of nip it in the bud so that it doesn't affect the next generation. But it does take a lot of courage to do this, would you agree?
Speaker 2:It takes a lot of courage, it takes a lot of self-awareness, I think you know. It takes a lot of resilience and it also takes keeping the communication channels open. You know, whether it's talking with family members, talking with a therapist, talking with friends. I think when we keep it bottled up inside, it gets worse. And pattern breaking sorry is really important. You know, as soon as you're self-aware of a pattern like have a friend who's father used to yell a lot and she, you know, sometimes would find herself starting to yell and she'd stop herself. Oh gosh, I don't want to be like him the self awareness is really important.
Speaker 1:And language too. I don't know about you, but I have found myself going to say something and thinking oh my gosh, that's my mother speaking, not me, and I have to zip it right away. I like to say words matter, yeah. On page 59 you write quote. When I sit down to write, higher creative forces speak to me and sometimes, while writing, I enter a trance-like state. I transcend universes where the deepest of creative forces are at play. You continue. Sometimes the muse is a real person and at other times it's an imaginary spirit. End quote. The writers and other creators I've interviewed speak of similar experiences. Some work to enter this state, others say they get the calling, have to drop whatever they're doing and race to find pen and paper, while others can call on their muse or muses as required. What is your experience, or is it a little bit of everything?
Speaker 2:I've had all. I've had both those experiences, which is why I always carry writing material with me, whether it's a small journal or just some pieces of index cards, in my purse for five and evening purse, because I have learned over the years to expect the unexpected, which means that I will have a thought at the most unusual time, usually when I'm driving to LA, because I live just north of Los Angeles and I'll you know I'm the one that's pulled her over on the side of the road journaling because a thought comes to me and I'm not very good at dictating, so I don't do what some people are lucky enough to be able to do into their phones. When I'm feeling in a bit of a creative slump and that happens, of course the muse doesn't arrive. I try all kinds of things. I usually just take a break from writing and go into nature or I would read other writers that inspire me, usually poets, and that just kind of helps me become inspired with my own work.
Speaker 2:But when I'm doing, when I'm working on my own books, I really don't read anyone else's books. I don't know why. It's just kind of been my pattern. Don't want to get influenced in any way. I can't call on the muse.
Speaker 1:Like some writers, I'm not unable to do that, it just I just have to be present and be aware when they, when they arrive and there are plenty of writers that swear by the fact that you absolutely have to be at that desk, but in chair the same time every day, so that your muse knows when to show up. What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 2:I think that's great for some people. I think we're all different. You know, I think I used to. I think new write for new writers, discipline is very important. I used to do that a lot in my earlier years. But I think as you come on, as you go on in years, you find your own pattern. We're all different.
Speaker 1:There's no rule oh, diana, it is so nice to hear you say that. I truly agree. I believe that it is a personal endeavor. When you sit down to write or you're standing and writing, whatever you're doing, you can't judge yourself by what works for someone else. I just thought of something else I wanted to talk about with you too. Years ago, I was a costume designer, stylist in the film industry, and what that meant was I really had to hone my observation skills, because you can't have a script editor saying, hey, you know what, think about continuity. You have to be on top of continuity for every shot regarding an actor's wardrobe continually, otherwise you will never work again. Um, but the other thing is you are a nurse and that is something that requires observational skills. It is a skill set that you've learned.
Speaker 2:I would like to hear your thoughts on observational skills, because I think they're critical for writing, actually for any creative endeavor that's really great, um, that you're mentioning that, because observation skills I think poets of all writers have the best observational skills because we have to really pay attention to details and we have to slow down time almost to write. It's just about like I'm staring at my window and I'm blessed to see the mountains in the ocean and if I focus in like a camera, if I focus in on a you know orange flower out there and I then I'm, you know, suddenly seeing hummingbirds, and so I think it's really about being mindful, focusing and just slowing down time. I think observation skills is really, uh, it's really all about that. Uh, paying attention.
Speaker 2:I'm reading a lot because I find I'm having a lot of memory loss. I'm reading a lot about memory loss and what they're saying really is, I mean, a lot of it comes with age, but what they're saying is just that you stop focusing at a certain point and when you don't focus, you can't remember. So I think focusing at sometimes I think as we get older it's harder Because we really got so much in our head and so many distractions and we always have distractions, but it just feels multi-cassing gets harder as you get older.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness, it's so good to hear you say that. I mean, it's the truth. It really gets more difficult as we age. Yeah, while we're talking about observation skills, there's something I do in one of my classes with students, and I learned this from my mother-in-law I think we're a Trader Joe's and I went to pick up some flash. She said well, let's smell the carnations, see if they're good ones. And she smelled them and she said, no, this one isn't good. But then she picked up another bunch. She said now, this is good.
Speaker 1:And I said really, carnations have a scent. I've never noticed. And she said that's because most of them don't. But here's, smell this. And I did, and it was like cinnamon, it was so beautiful. And ever since then I've used this experience in teaching observation skills, because it shows us that sometimes things aren't always as they seem, and to get closer and closer until maybe you start to recognize other senses, picking up on whatever it is that you're looking at. In my case it was the beautiful scent from the carnations, and so it's taught me that not to be so quick to disregard something.
Speaker 2:I love that. I love that. Yes, she's changing your mind. Oh, she changed your mindset, didn't she?
Speaker 1:Yes, she did that little rascal, and I wish I could have changed her mindset sometimes too.
Speaker 2:Oh right, Exactly. Oh yes, Sounds like you have some mother-in-law stories to tell.
Speaker 1:Oh, don't get me started, Diana. Ok, moving forward, talking about grandmothers and mother-in-laws, I found it interesting that your grandmother typed her journal. In a way it felt like she wanted to disconnect herself from her story.
Speaker 2:Any thoughts on this. First, let me start out by saying that the journal was typed retroactively. She typed that after she came to the United States because she had more time and I think also because it was her way of healing. She learned English in Vienna because she was. She actually started med school in Vienna, but she because she was orphaned at the age of 11, she didn't have any money to go through med school, so that was her big frustration in life. So she learned English very early on. So when she came to the States she wrote this journal. She was, she was in an abusive marriage, she was very lonely in a new country with a nine-year-old daughter my mother and so I think the journal became her best friend and her confidant. So it was typed, and it's typed single-faced, with a lot of strikeovers and when she died well, when I was writing my first memoir, regina's Closet, I said I'm writing a book about my grandmother.
Speaker 2:I don't know why she took her life. I don't know anything really much about her, except that she loved me very much and that she got me had a type and that she inspired my writing and my reading. But I need to know, like, what happened with her. So I went to a psychic and the psychic told me just I want you to sit down one day and Call her in. Just sit in the chair and have her face.
Speaker 2:You call her in and I called her in and she actually told me go to my closet, there's something for you there. There's a surprise. And it was the journal. So the journal was there. It was 50 pages, single space on yellowing paper in a plastic sheet, and I transcribed it all beautiful English, I mean, you know a lot, a little bit, but enough for me to read which she talked about being orphan, losing her mother, having to identify her mother in the color epidemic in Europe, and that was another power of our lives, because I wrote this book during our pandemic over 19. So, yeah, so it was a retrospective. Just a long answer to your question, sorry, melanie.
Speaker 1:Oh, please don't apologize. Everything you said was relative and important, and that's the book. I haven't read Regina's closet. I need to read it. Let's talk about your writing process. When you come up with an idea, do you immediately know whether it's going to be a poem, a chapbook of poetry or a memoir or something else?
Speaker 2:Well, this tricky one, because this is my 14th book and so I kind of it kind of comes to me. I actually thought this book was just going to be an essay, so I wrote it as an essay. It had essays published of excerpts of this book before I even wrote the book, and then I decided to expand on each chapter or each section of the essay and it became a book. I kind of go with the flow of things, I suppose. Yeah, it's just really hard to identify that sometimes I'm really in a poetry zone, because I'm a poet and a memoirist and I'm like I'm definitely doing the next book poetry, and other times I'll have an epiphany or a transcendental moment and I'll decide to do a memoir, which is what happened here.
Speaker 1:And I've had some authors say to me I started out writing a poem, which I don't normally write, but the poem ended up being in the book, or the poem grew into a book.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's true, that's definitely what happens. I think people ask me why do you write? I said I have no choice, I have to write. You know people say why did you choose to write that story? Well, I had to. When I teach my memoir classes and I do a lot of those people say you know, I'm in my 70s, I have so many stories I don't know which one to tell. And so what I tell them is just make a list of all of those important events in your life and circle, the one that just is pulling on your heartstrings and that's the one you write, and that's usually the one that will have the most energy. So I think you know, we just we write because it's something we like had to write it, you just had to do it?
Speaker 1:And what is your advice or your thoughts for anyone who wants to write a memoir but they don't feel comfortable writing it in first person, but they feel safer writing that story as a fictional piece, either in first or third person?
Speaker 2:I think it's great. I just, I just say, just write. You know, whatever form is good for you. I've tried writing in third person. I can't do it. I just I do have a couple of novels in me, but I just they would be first person novels. I think it's a real art to be able to write in third person and people that write in third person think it's an art to write in first person. So I think there's definitely a calling that we each have. You know, I had a friend that had a very traumatic childhood and she's a pretty well-known writer and she decides to write a novel of her book because her parents were still alive and even though people will know that it really happened, if she just felt safer in the universe, just not using her name on the book and using third person. So it's whatever works for you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's that story absolutely needing to come out and there's no way you can stop it. Exactly when have you found writing difficult and how have you worked through this time?
Speaker 2:to return to the page For me, writing time is difficult when I'm going through personal challenging times where my family is like my husband got very sick during COVID, I couldn't write at all. When I was challenged with two cancer diagnoses and depression, I couldn't write at all. I think those times are the times when I pull out the journal and put jottings down and those jottings very often turn into articles or poems or books. But I think when we're really struggling it's really hard to write. Personally, I think all writers have to be a little bit melancholy to write well. I think it serves our creativity well. But I think when times are really tough it's not even about having time to write. When times are challenging, it's just the energy, the writing, creative energy is just not there for me. I do something else.
Speaker 1:I agree, and I've spoken with probably a couple of hundred authors over the last three years this is the fourth year going into the podcast and during that first part of the pandemic, some of them said, oh my gosh, I couldn't write, I couldn't do anything, I just closed down. I could barely read a book. Others said, oh, it was the most writing I have ever done, ever. I just couldn't stop. So it's what works for you. And getting back to what you said about the timing, you can't force it. I don't think Some people think you can. I don't think you can, and you cannot judge yourself by what works for someone else. That's just awful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. We are all different and just have to listen to your inner voice and you have to be self aware of what brings you joy, where your creativity lies, et cetera.
Speaker 1:For anyone listening who has not read your latest memoir Hummingbird, could you tell us a little about the name of the book?
Speaker 2:Oh sure, yeah, I'm glad you asked that question. So it's Hummingbird messages from my ancestor. It's a memoir with reflection and writing prompts, and the reason I called it Hummingbird is because during the pandemic I was stuck in my home office a lot and I had a little bush outside with red flowers and every day Hummingbird came to visit me and after a while I kind of started talk about being self aware. I thought there's a message in it. There's this Hummingbird trying to tell me something. What is the message?
Speaker 2:Ever since I wrote Regina's Clause in the early 2000s, I've had a picture of my grandmother on my desk and I would look at my picture of my grandmother and then I'd look at the Hummingbird. I'm like this seems to be some kind of connection here. And then I started reading about Hummingbirds and it's been said, especially by the Native Americans, that the Hummingbirds are messages from heaven and I thought, okay, this is grandma giving me a message. And, as she was, I kept asking the hummingbird questions. It would flutter a little bit, stay with me, sometimes longer than others, and the answers came. The answers came, and so that's why I called it hummingbird, because I realized that there were questions that are being answered by the hummingbird and there was a reason that it was coming every day for visit me.
Speaker 1:And isn't it great that you used your observation skills, ha ha ha, that's right, it's true.
Speaker 2:If I hadn't looked out the window I wouldn't have seen it. It's so true, it's very true. So I mean I could have just said, oh, how cute isn't he. And he flies away and not paid attention. But of course I was so bored so often I did. I think I paid a lot more attention during this pandemic.
Speaker 1:There's a lesson in there somewhere, Diana. Okay, what are you currently reading?
Speaker 2:Oh, I love that question. Actually I don't like that question. Ha ha, ha ha. But I will answer it because, like my mother, I read a few books at a time. Always on my bedside table there's usually a book by Tick Naut Han, because I love him. There's usually a book of poetry and then there's usually a memoir that I'm reading. So right now Tick Naut Han book that on my bedside is called Tears Become Rain. It's a collection of essays of people who have been inspired by Tick Naut Han. And then I have a book called Secrets of Healing by my. He's actually an acupuncturist down in Santa Monica that I go to every week and it's a very thick book and I just read snippets of it every morning. And then I just ordered a book that looks really fascinating to me called One Long River Notes on Wonder by Brian Doyle, and I'm excited to read that he had a brain tumor. But coincidentally enough, after I ordered it I started reading it on Kindle. On, the first chapter talks about hummingbirds. I'm like whoa this book was meant for me.
Speaker 2:I don't know why.
Speaker 1:I definitely wouldn't question that.
Speaker 2:It was just in a workshop I was taking, just mentioned it to all of us. I'm like, okay, I need to read this book. I like reading inspiring memoirs because I like inspiring others. So I don't like reading memoirs that bring you down, because I think we all need inspiration. We all need hope. I think hope is the thing a lot of us are missing these days.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we sure need it this year, absolutely. Before you go, could you tell us a little about the Diana and Simon Rabb writer in residence series at UCSB?
Speaker 2:Well, I've done that, but right now what I do is I sponsor the Rabb Fellows in the writing program. It's basically between 15 and 25 students that get a private mentor each semester and they study various aspects of whether it's sociological or scientific and they do research projects on them and then they make a presentation at the end of the year. So it's a really great program. It's called the Rabb Fellow Program and I go to the. They have a showcase at the end of the year, which I love. These students are so smart I mean I was not that smart when I was 20 and researching cultural issues, political issues, gender issues, ai issues I mean so many. The diversity, because they're students of all different majors coming together in this writing class, and so it's wonderful. I did do the writer in residence, but I think with COVID we stopped doing it because people weren't coming out to events anymore.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it's gradually changing, but it's definitely slowed. I was thinking about what you said about how smart these kids are at university right now, especially the students who are curious, who want to go beyond what the textbook offers. As a student, and in my 20s, 30s, 40s and 50s, I was kind of a little radical. I would march for issues that I either believed in or felt strongly against, and maybe that curiosity is inherited because my mother fought for women's rights and equal pay in nursing in Australia and my sons are also curious. You know they have a lot of questions.
Speaker 1:A couple of months ago I moderated a panel about Gen Z in Santa Barbara at El Encanto in Santa Barbara, and oh my goodness, it was fascinating. The two young adults that we have were so smart, so caring, so devoted to issues. They made me and my youth look like a pussycat and I thought I was quite the rebel. I hear a lot of people complain about Gen Zs, but I guess, like any generation, there are just some that are incredible, and there are a lot of Gen Zs doing some fabulous work and they make me curious.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't know. I've been studying that also. I'm trying to understand. I think I felt personally, because a lot of my friends were drafted during the Vietnam War, so I was also marching on the streets, but I think I was doing things to make the world better. I was actually getting petition signed. I was, I don't know. I felt more involved. I feel like a lot of them and I don't want to generalize or doing a lot of complaining, but I don't know how active they are in changing the universe. I'm not really sure. I don't know enough about it. I'd be curious if you did or if anyone can offer some ideas on that.
Speaker 1:I'll put some links in the show notes to different Gen Z organizations and a little bit of research that I've been looking into for anyone who is interested who can take a look. What encouraged me at this Gen Z symposium was the age difference in the audience. There were young kids in their senior year in high school, there were college kids from UCSB adults, and the senior citizens said in the Q&A we are so grateful that you had this symposium because we have learned so much. We didn't think anybody cared about us anymore, but the panel that is here tonight has proved us wrong. So there you go, a little bit of education. And we can't always listen to what we are here on the news or read in the news. It's important we get out there and talk to people.
Speaker 2:That's so beautiful. I'm so encouraged to hear that. Really, that's fantastic. Yeah, and to change old minds is quite something.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. That's a feat in itself. Diana, how is your health?
Speaker 2:Well, kind of healthy, but yeah, a lot of it's genetics, but yeah. I'm still battling cancer and I'm doing the best I can.
Speaker 1:Well, from where I'm sitting, you look radiant, healthy and beautiful.
Speaker 2:Thank you for saying that, though Mandy appreciate that.
Speaker 1:You have a calmness about you, something we could all do with more of.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I just wrote an article for Psychology Today on that. I think I've been meditating. I've been doing transcendental meditation for about four or five decades, so I think it's had a good effect on me. Yeah, I think meditating is important.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I agree, and what a different world we would be if everyone meditated For just a little while every day. I do love the artwork on the cover of Hummingbird. It's beautiful. Who is the artist?
Speaker 2:Kat Lynch, who did my writing for Bliss. Yeah, she's great, thank you.
Speaker 1:Diana, thank you so much for being a guest on the show. It's been a great conversation and I wish you all the best with your new book, hummingbird, a Memoir Messages from my Ancestors.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Mandy, Wonderful talking with you. You're so seasoned. Obviously I really appreciate being on your program.
Speaker 1:You've been listening to my conversation with Diana Rabbe about her new book Hummingbird, a memoir Messages from my Ancestors. To find out more about the Bookshop podcast, go to thebookshoppodcastcom and make sure to subscribe and leave a review wherever you listen to the show. You can also follow me at Mandy Jackson Beverly on X, instagram and Facebook and on YouTube at the Bookshop podcast. If you have a favorite indie bookshop that you'd like to suggest we have on the podcast, I'd love to hear from you via the contact form at thebookshoppodcastcom. The Bookshop podcast is written and produced by me, mandy Jackson Beverly, theme music provided by Brian Beverly, executive assistant to Mandy, adrienne Otterhan and graphic design by Frances Barala. Thanks for listening and I'll see you next time. '.