Deserts to Mountaintops: Choosing Our Healing Through Radical Self-Acceptance is the second volume in the anthology series published by Soul Speak Press released on January 25th, 2024. Delia Sullivan is a contributing author!

My chapter is “The Story I Told Myself.”

The book chronicles 20 women's voices and their unique journey from the desert of self-abandonment to the mountaintop of self-love and radical acceptance. Each chapter focuses on one woman’s specific story, recounting how she has chosen herself by prioritizing her body, mind, and spirit healing.

The inspiration for this collection of essays stems from the lead author, Jessica Buchanan's own journey to self-acceptance that began in the deserts of Somalia while she was being held hostage by pirates in 2011. It was in this desert, where Jessica was systematically starved, mentally abused, and physically tortured, that she realized the fear and angst she was feeling was somewhat familiar because she had been holding HERSELF hostage for decades- with food. And the ransom demand had almost cost her life.

In the weeks and months that Jessica sat alone, and then in the aftermath of her rescue, Jessica’s struggles with body image and self-acceptance threatened to hold her hostage once more, and it was only through the struggle to heal and the commitment to continue on this journey, that Jessica has tasted the sweetness of believing she is enough and worthy, just as she is, that has been the inspiration for this book.