What It Takes to Heal

By: Prentis Hemphill

Published by Random House, 2025-06-10

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From one of the most prominent voices in the trauma conversation comes a groundbreaking new way to heal on a personal and a collective level, showing us that we don’t have to carry our emotional burdens alone. “I love this book.”—Bessel van der Kolk, author of The Body Keeps the Score “In a time when so many of us are being trained in cynicism, this book stands in necessary defiance.”—Cole Arthur Riley, author of Black Liturgies and This Here Flesh This Random House Book Club edition includes a discussion guide at the back of the book. What It Takes to Heal asserts that the principles of embodiment—the recognition of our body’s sensations and habits, and the beliefs that inform them—are critical to lasting healing and change. Hemphill, an expert embodiment practitioner, therapist, and activist who has partnered with Brené Brown, Tarana Burke, and Esther Perel, among others, demonstrates a future in which healing is done in community. Hemphill weaves together stories from their own experience as a trauma survivor with clinical accounts and lessons learned from their time as a social movement architect. They ask, “What would it do to movements, to our society and culture, to have the principles of healing at the very center? And what does it do to have healing at the center of every structure and everything we create?” In this life-affirming framework for the way forward, Hemphill shows us how to heal our bodies, minds, and souls—to develop the interpersonal skills necessary to break down the doors of disconnection and take the necessary risks to reshape our world toward justice.