My name is Michealene Cristini Risley. I met Arianna recently when we both were speaking at the Pacific Business Women's Conference in Sacramento. I loved listening to her speak, she was poignant and funny. I have also read her book on Fearlessness. Being fearless is tough. I know. I have to exercise that muscle every time I get in front of audience and tell my personal story.

My personal story is one of sexual abuse by family members. It is a subject that no one wants to talk about, and certainly not speak about. I have a book that I co-authored with three other women called This Is Not the Life I Ordered. The book comes out in the spring of 2007. In our book, I talk about my personal experiences with sexual abuse and how much it affected who I was, and who I became. It caused a great deal of pain for me. I also learned some incredible lessons. I wouldn't give up what happened to me, because it gave me great gifts.

In January, I am planning to go back and visit with family to talk through and let them read the book before it is published. I am not looking forward to it. I know that I have to do it. I love and care about them enough to do this, but it is very difficult for me to drum up enough courage to go. That fearlessness doesn't come lightly sometimes.

I speak at many places about sexual abuse and my goal is to help reach victims who may have not been as lucky as me. And I have been lucky. See, what I finally came to understand was that the sexual abuse that I experienced, did not define who I was. We cannot heal individually until we realize that the sexual abuse has nothing to do with us, we didn't cause it. Until we understand that as a society, and stop keeping abuse a dirty little secret, we won't be able to stop creating victims.

I am not talking about the child molesters that the world knows about. The ones like Richard Allen Davis who kidnapped Polly Klass. Those types of crimes are less that 5% of sexual abuse victims. It is our fathers and our brothers or an unsuspected uncle or neighbor.
There is so much fear and shame involved in telling the truth about one's experience with abuse. Yet, in many ways it helps you heal. I don't want to cause pain to my family members, but I know that my visit is going to cause pain for all of us. Anger is going to play a part in that visit as well. How could I tell our story in so public of a way? How could I shame our family like this? I can understand those feelings, and yet this issue is far bigger than my personal story. I am going to call my family and set up a trip to see them in January. I will keep you posted!

Read More: Richard Allen Davis

I saw the movie Eragon over the weekend with my children. We have been reading the book as a family for the last few weeks, and have been mesmerized by the story. For those of you who may not know the author's story, Christopher Paolini was home schooled for his entire life, he graduated high school at the age of 15 through an accredited correspondence course at American School, Chicago, IL. Following graduation, he started work on what would become the novel Eragon and its sequel Eldest, all set in Alagaësia.

In 2002, Eragon was published privately by Chris' parents through Paolini International, LLC. To promote the book, Paolini toured over 135 schools and libraries, discussing reading and writing, all the while dressed in "a medieval costume of red shirt, billowy black pants, lace-up boots, and a jaunty black cap." Paolini actually created the cover art for the first edition of Eragon, which featured Saphira's eye. He also drew the maps on the inside covers of his books. [5]

During one of his promotional tours, he gave a speech at the school of the stepson of Carl Hiaasen; Hiaasen enjoyed the book so much, he told his publisher, Knopf about it. An offer was made by Knopf for Eragon and the rest of the Inheritance trilogy. The second edition of Eragon was published in August 2003. At the age of nineteen, he became a New York Times bestselling author.

I found the movie to be less-engaging then the book. The book had many more sub-plots and details that I missed when I saw the movie. Great books are hard to duplicate for the motion picture screen. In the middle of the movie, I was struck by a particular scene and the wisdom of this young writer. At this point in the movie, Eragon had made it to the stronghold of the rebels. He was overlooking the battle as it was about to begin, when Saphira his mind-reading dragon approached him. He was struggling with why he had been chosen as the leader of the rebels. As she explained the choice, he said to her, "I am not without fear." She said in her wisdom, "without fear, you would not know courage."

Think about it. How poignant her words of wisdom. Remember your own moments with fear. The feelings that comes over a person experiencing fear can be all-encompassing. You can choose to stay in the fear or you could choose to act on it. Move past it. Yet how could you know courage without the taste of a dry mouth and sweaty hands, a beating heart or a quiver in your voice? When you face that fear or deal with the situation at hand, you can experience a surge of pride or accomplishment that you have had the courage to speak out. WOW!
When I think of fearlessness now, I am glad that I have know fear. There is no such thing as cowardice in feeling your fear, it is the only way to appreciate and know courage when you act on it.

Happy Holidays!

Read More: Christopher Paolini, Carl Hiaasen