Meet Ashlee Sellars

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Ashlee Sellars a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Ashlee, so great to be with you and I think a lot of folks are going to benefit from hearing your story and lessons and wisdom. Imposter Syndrome is something that we know how words to describe, but it’s something that has held people back forever and so we’re really interested to hear about your story and how you overcame imposter syndrome.

For most of my life, I was told I was nothing. Worse than nothing—I was a thing.

I grew up with deep trauma, both personal and generational. My parents met in a mental hospital. Abuse and cruelty were constants in our home. I was bullied, and I bullied others. I was called horrible, broken, worse than my father ever was. At 17, after years of harm and survival, I defended myself against a man who had abused me for years—my stepfather. But no one asked if I was safe. I wasn’t protected—I was put right back in the same house. And eventually, I left. I stayed with others for survival.

Then, something tragic happened. Someone was harmed, and someone lost their life. I wasn’t mentally present enough to prevent it or protect anyone. I carry that with me daily. I carry Cynthia with me—in my work, in my heart, in my commitment to help others know they are not alone. I cannot change the past, but I can hold space for truth, and I can work every day to prevent harm and help communities heal.

When I came home after years of incarceration, I returned to a world that still saw me the way the system had defined me: felon, threat, less-than. I didn’t know how to use a cell phone. I hadn’t lived outside in two decades. I heard the words “no felons allowed” more times than I can count. Even when people believed in me, systems did not. I was constantly told what I wasn’t. And yet, I still believed that maybe—just maybe—I could be more.

I started showing up in spaces I never imagined—courtrooms, community circles, legislative panels. I helped design programs for people like me, only to be told I couldn’t participate in them. I was invited to speak, to lead, to sit at tables of power—only to hear people ask, “How did you get in here?” Sometimes it was a joke. Sometimes it wasn’t. The question always lingered. Why me?

For a long time, I thought that imposter syndrome meant I wasn’t ready. But now I know: it means the world wasn’t ready for people like me. It means the rooms I walk into were never designed for someone with my story to feel at home.

I’ve overcome imposter syndrome not by believing I am exceptional, but by knowing I am an example. I am one of so many who could thrive if only they were given the chance. Every compliment I receive, I see reflected in the faces of those still behind walls—people who hold even more brilliance, love, and resilience than I do. I don’t ask, “Why me?” anymore. I ask, “Why not all of us?”

I do not walk into these rooms alone. I carry Cynthia. I carry every person I left behind. And I show up not just to belong—but to build spaces where we all can.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

Today, I serve as the Director of Network and Power Building at the Raphah Institute, a nonprofit dedicated to transforming the way we respond to harm and community needs. At Raphah, we believe that accountability and healing are not opposites—they are intertwined. We work alongside individuals who have caused harm and those who have been harmed, creating community-based responses that center truth, repair, and restoration, not punishment.

One of the initiatives I’m most proud to help lead is our Accountability and Repair Conferencing process. It provides a space for those impacted by serious harm to voice their needs and for those responsible to step into real accountability—facing the impact they’ve caused and working toward tangible repair. This process doesn’t erase harm—it creates the conditions for real healing to begin. We also work to prevent harm before it starts through our Early Embrace Initiative, partnering with home-based early childhood providers in historically marginalized communities to build safety, opportunity, and dignity for our youngest community members.

What excites me most is seeing lives, families, and entire communities heal in ways the traditional justice system could never imagine. Our work is about building a world where people are not defined by their worst moments, but by their capacity to grow, heal, and contribute.

This year, we are expanding our restorative work to include young adults ages 18–26 through new partnerships. We are also deepening our investment in early childhood education access and support for immigrant and refugee families. Our hope is that by strengthening families and offering healing-centered alternatives to punishment, we can transform generational cycles of harm into legacies of hope.

For me, Raphah is more than a nonprofit. It is a community of healing, accountability, and belonging—the kind of space I needed as a child, the kind of space I fight every day to build for others. I am grateful to be part of work that reminds people: you are not alone, your story is not over, and you are worthy of restoration.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

1. Resilience:
For much of my life, resilience wasn’t a choice—it was survival. I had to find ways to keep moving when it felt like the world was determined to break me. Resilience gave me the ability to move through systems and circumstances that were meant to silence me. But today, as a parent, I wrestle with a different question: How do my husband and I create opportunities for our children to be resilient without them first having to be broken?

That’s the dream—to raise children, and to nurture a community, where resilience is built through love, through challenge, through growth—not through trauma. My advice for others on this journey: practice resilience not just in hardship, but also in joy. Build it through encouragement, through safe failure, through trying again—not only through surviving harm.

2. Voice:
I have been outspoken in nuanced ways for most of my life, even when experience taught me that speaking up often led to punishment, silencing, or being disregarded. I learned early that my pain was invisible to many—but even then, I could not stay fully silent in the face of injustice.

One of the deepest wounds I carry is knowing I did not use my voice to protect Cynthia. That truth reshaped my life. Now, my voice is committed to honoring life and dignity, even when it is uncomfortable or costly. I use my voice to expose the dehumanizing practices of the systems I survived—to ensure that 21 years of incarceration and 38 years of abuse are not wasted, but transformed into pathways for others’ healing.

My advice: know that using your voice may not always be easy, safe, or immediately celebrated. But your voice can be a vessel for truth, for dignity, and for change. Even when it trembles—even when it costs you—it might be the only voice someone can hear in that moment. And sometimes, speaking up can save a life.

Okay, so before we go, is there anyone you’d like to shoutout for the role they’ve played in helping you develop the essential skills or overcome challenges along the way?

Community. Always community.

I am not here because of one person—I am here because of a network of love, truth, challenge, and care that surrounds me. My husband reminds me daily that love is patient, consistent, and expansive. His encouragement grounds me when the weight of it all feels heavy. Our children give me so much hope; their brilliance, compassion, and courage to show up for others reveal what is possible in a world shaped by dignity, not harm.

I’m also shaped by the families I am honored to serve through the Raphah Institute. While I receive a paycheck, I experience this work as a calling—one where I’m invited into people’s lives at their most vulnerable moments. Their bravery—to name their truth, to ask for what they need, to trust community when the system has failed them—has taught me more than any classroom ever could. And the young people I’ve walked alongside? Their ability to imagine new pathways for justice and healing, when given just a little space and support, is nothing short of revolutionary.

Every step of growth I’ve experienced has come from being in proximity to people who believed in restoration—not perfection. Who gave me room to lead, to learn, to love, and to grow. I am not self-made. I am community-made.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.raphah.org
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marieashton423?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashlee-sellars-5143a7161/