Jonathan Van Ness



Jonathan McDonald Van Ness (born March 28, 1987) is an American hairdresser, podcast host, activist, actor, author, and television personality.

Over the Top: A Raw Journey to Self-Love (2019)

 * More families should watch the Olympics together. To me, those are core American family values: Cheering on a corrupt institutional body that's super problematic with money and opportunity but we all pretend like it's an equal playing field and celebrate it - what's more American than that?
 * page 17


 * The reality is that LGBTQ+ people face challenges at disproportionally higher rates than their straight counterparts - drug use, sex work, and financial instability can be an unfortunate result. My privilege as a young cis white man whose parents weren't going to let me drown afforded me the ability to make those mistakes and live to talk about it.
 * page 117/118


 * Just because we mess up doesn't mean all the lessons we learned are undone. Healing can be imperfect.
 * page 173


 * There are a million ways to reach recovery. Don't let anyone tell you you can't find a way that works for you.
 * page 173


 * Life is so much a daily exercise in learning to love yourself and forgive yourself, over and over.
 * page 207


 * Being normal is being completely unique, because nobody's the same.
 * page 218


 * My philosophy was very much to embrace yourself and love what you are, instead of making you something you're not. Refine what you already have - don't change it at its core. That's always been my whole ethos.
 * page 232


 * Most of my twenties I was focused on survival or self-destruction. I worked hard to get through the turbulence caused by my childhood, and I had come out stronger, smarter, and developed the tools to self-soothe and grow. Now I was ready to help others do the same. To have the opportunity to be able to do things for other people, to try to be my best authentic self and have that resonate in a way that inspires self-acceptance in others, was blowing my mind on a minute-by-minute basis.
 * page 247


 * We are all a beautiful jumble of layers, parts, and mixtures of experiences, but my most important part, and in my opinion everyone's most valuable part, is the one that chooses self-love instead of self-harm in the grand sweeping ways but also the little ways every single day.
 * page 262