#WCW Feminist Profile: Coretta Scott King

This week, while we honor and celebrate the life of Martin Luther King Jr., I also wanted to take a moment to celebrate Coretta Scott King. Coretta was an American activist, author, musician, singer, and civil rights leader, and fought alongside her husband in the Civil Rights Movement during the 1960’s.

Coretta Scott, named after her grandmother Cora McLaughlin Scott, was born in Marion, Alabama on April 27th, 1927 to Obadiah and Bernice Scott. The Scott family had owned a farm since the American Civil War, but were not wealthy by any means. During the Great Depression, Coretta and her siblings picked cotton to help earn money for the family.

As a self-described ‘tomboy’ as a child, she enjoyed climbing trees and wrestling boys, and was very strong for her size. Her brother, Obadiah, stated that Coretta “always tried to excel in everything she did”. Despite having a formal education themselves, her parents were determined to provide education for their children. Her mother, Bernice, was quoted as saying “my children are going to college, even if it means I only have but one dress to put on”.

Coretta and her siblings went to a one-room elementary school 5 miles from their home, and later, due to racial segregation, were bussed 9 miles away to Lincoln Normal School, the closest black high school in Marion, Alabama. (The bus was driven by her mother, Bernice, who took all the local black teenagers to school and back) In 1945, Coretta graduated valedictorian and enrolled in Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, where her older sister attended. There, she studied Interracial Education, which was a program that recruited nonwhite students and gave them full scholarships to attend the historically white campus.

Coretta said that “Antioch had envisioned itself as a laboratory in democracy but had no black students. Edythe (her sister) became the first African American to attend Antioch on a completely integrated basis, and was joined by two other black female students in the fall of 1943. Pioneering is never easy, and all of us who followed my sister at Antioch owe her a great debt of gratitude”.

Because of her experienced in college, she became politically active, joining the Antioch chapter of the NAACP and the college’s Race Relations and Civil Liberties Committees. But college wasn’t without many trials; in her second year, as a requirement for her degree, she requested to perform her required teaching practice at Yellow Springs’ public schools, but was denied by the school board based on racial discrimination. She appealed to her college administration, but they were unable to change the situation in the local school system. Instead, Antioch employed her at the college’s associated laboratory. 

Coretta won a scholarship to New England Conservatory of Music in Boston and transferred there, where she met Martin Luther King Jr. Her friend, Mary Powell, had given Coretta phone number to Martin (along with two other girl’s numbers). However, Martin was unimpressed with the other girls, and called her on the phone, after which they met in person. The rest is history. Two weeks after they’d met, Martin had wrote to his mother saying that he’d met his future wife.

Coretta took a little longer to get there; however, she detailed to her sister Edythe her feelings for Martin and when asked what she liked about him, she said he reminded her so much of their father. Edythe said she knew Martin was “the one” for Coretta at that very moment.

King's parents visited him in the fall and had suspicions about Coretta Scott after seeing how clean his apartment was. While the Kings had tea and meals with their son and Scott, Martin Sr. turned his attention to her and insinuated that her plans of a career in music were not fitting for a Baptist minister's wife. After Coretta did not respond to his questioning of their romance being serious, Martin Sr. asked if she took his son "seriously". King's father also told her that there were many other women his son was interested in and had "a lot to offer." After telling him that she had "a lot to offer" as well, Martin Luther King Sr. and his wife went on to try and meet with members of Coretta's family. Once the two obtained Edythe's number from Coretta, they sat down with her and had lunch with her. During their time together, Martin Luther King Sr. tried to ask Edythe about the relationship between her sister and his son. Edythe insisted that her sister was an excellent choice for Martin Luther King Jr., but also felt that Coretta did not need to bargain for a husband. [1]

On Valentine’s Day, 1953, they announced their engagement in the Atlanta Daily World, and were married on June 18th, 1953. Unlike what was acceptable at this time, Coretta had the vow to ‘obey her husband’ removed from the ceremony. After completing her degree in voice and piano at New England Conservatory, they moved to Montgomery, Alabama in September of 1954.

Coretta said that "after we married, we moved to Montgomery, Alabama, where my husband had accepted an invitation to be the pastor of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. Before long, we found ourselves in the middle of the Montgomery bus boycott, and Martin was elected leader of the protest movement. As the boycott continued, I had a growing sense that I was involved in something so much greater than myself, something of profound historic importance. I came to the realization that we had been thrust into the forefront of a movement to liberate oppressed people, not only in Montgomery but also throughout our country, and this movement had worldwide implications. I felt blessed to have been called to be a part of such a noble and historic cause."[2]

Devoted to the her cause, Coretta gave up her dreams of becoming a classical singer so that Martin could become a full-time pastor of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church; this sacrifice in the name of the movement would become symbolic for the actions of African American women during the movement.[3] The mid 1950’s were tumultuous, and the Kings received many death threats at Martin’s involvement with the Montgomery Bus Boycott. By the end of the boycott, Mrs. King and her husband had come to believe in nonviolent protests as a way of expression consistent with biblical teachings.[4] Two days after the integration of Montgomery's bus service, on December 23, a gunshot blasted through the front door of the King home while Coretta, Martin, and their daughter were asleep, though the three were unharmed. [5] As a family, they continued to be subject to acts of violence.

Coretta served as a delegate for the Women’s Strike for Peace Conference in Geneva, Switzerland in 1962 and in New York in 1963. She worked hard to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and spoke with Malcom X days before his assassination. On March 26, 1965 Coretta and Martin, along with her father, marched to Montgomery.

Later, in January 1966, she criticized the sexism of the Civil Rights Movement in the New Lady magazine, saying in part, "Not enough attention has been focused on the roles played by women in the struggle. By and large, men have formed the leadership in the civil rights struggle but...women have been the backbone of the whole civil rights movement." [6] In 1968, she participated in a Women Strike for Peace protest at the capital of Washington D.C., with over 5,000 women. She co-chaired the Congress of Women conference and was part of the Jeannette Rankin Brigade, which honored the first woman elected to the House of Representatives.

Two days after her husband's death, Coretta spoke at Ebenezer Baptist Church where she said her husband told their children, "If a man had nothing that was worth dying for, then he was not fit to live." She talked about his beliefs and ideals and said while he may be dead, "his spirit will never die”. [7] She also delivered a speech at a rally he was supposed to attend, not long after his assassination, in New York City; using his notes, Coretta wrote her own speech and delivered it to the crown with strength, and later took hold of the movement that was hurting in her husband’s absence.

Eventually, she broadened her cause to women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, economic issues, world peace, amongst others. In a Solidarity speech, she asked women to “unite and form a solid block of women power to fight the three great evils of racism, poverty and war.” [8] Following this speech, she spoke at an anti-war demonstration in Central Park in place of her husband, and asked, “why a nation as rich as ours should be blighted by poverty, disease, and illiteracy?”, reminding the audience that while we fight wars abroad, there are many, many wars we fight in our own country, which claim the lives of children, as well as women and men.

As a leader in the movement, she founded the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change in Atlanta, serving as the president and CEO until passing it onto their son Dexter, and in 1969 she released her memoirs, My Life with Martin Luther King, Jr.

Coretta Scott King’s life was full to the brim of not just advocacy, but action, not just understanding, but compassion. She was a strong willed woman who fought for what she believed in, sacrificed for her causes, and never stopped, even after unspeakable tragedy, loss, and despair. She was such a brilliant woman, so talented, so commanding. We must not forget to celebrate her life, along with her husband’s. They were two of the most important people in our history, and their life’s work, their sacrifices, cannot be in vain. In times as hard and trying as these, we cannot let our America stand for anything less than refuge, peace, and goodwill. We must use our voices, we must use our power, as the King’s demonstrated, through nonviolent protest and political action.

[1] Bagley, Edyth Scott (2012). Desert Rose: The Life and Legacy of Coretta Scott King. Tuscaloosa, Alabama: The University of Alabama Press. pp. 17–19. ISBN 978-0-8173-1765-2.
[2] "Coretta Scott King Interview - Academy of Achievement". Achievement.org. Archived from the original on 2015-04-23. Retrieved 2015-05-13.
[3] Bagley, p. 108.
[4] Bagley, p. 144
[5] Garrow, p. 83.
[6] Civil Rights History from the Ground Up: Local Struggles, a National Movement. Books.google.com. Retrieved 2015-05-13.
[7] "Widow Hopes For Fulfillment of King's Dream". Jet. April 18, 1968.
[8] Pappas, Heather. "Coretta Scott King". Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. Archived from the original on 2007-10-12. Retrieved 2007-09-10.

Disparate Impact and the New Supreme Court

Disparate Impact occurs when a ‘protected group’ or ‘protected class of people’ are disproportionately impacted by policies, practices, rules, or other systems that appear to be neutral, while disparate treatment is intentional discrimination.[1] Both terms refer to discriminatory practices, however, many people still have trouble believing in, understanding, and even ‘seeing’ disparate impact. This presents a huge problem for those protected groups who are systematically affected by biases and discriminatory practices.

In legal terms, “disparate impact is a legal doctrine which declares that a policy can be considered discriminatory if it ‘adversely impacts’ a group based on that group’s traits, such as its race, color, religion, or sex. This is especially true when there is no legitimate need for such a policy. If someone finds a policy or practices to be discriminatory, then he [she/they] is [are] permitted to challenge it, claiming it has an “adverse effect” on those who would be otherwise protected. Typically, disparate impact is considered when a policy that is unintentionally discriminatory becomes discriminatory when put into practice.”[2]

The origin of this law is Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968, commonly referred to as the Fair Housing Act of 1968 [3], and was pioneered by civil rights advocates like Martin Luther King Jr. and NAACP’s Washington director Clarence Mitchell Jr., who worked to end race-based housing patterns that were still in force by the late 1960's; while the bill’s original goal was to extend federal protection to civil rights workers (1964), it was eventually expanded to address racial and religious discrimination in housing (1968)[4], followed by gender (1974), and people with disabilities (1988).

So what does this have to do with our current state of affairs?

The Supreme Court was shaken with the retirement of Conservative Justice Anthony Kennedy on June 21, 2018. Following his vacancy, Judge Brett Kavanaugh was nominated to fill his seat. After several months of turmoil [for victims and advocates] following the allegations of sexual assault by Dr. Christine Blasey-Ford and many others, Kavanaugh was sworn into office as an associate justice to the U.S. Supreme Court on October 6, 2018, with a 50-48 vote. While this may seem like old news, the tidal wave of impact this decision has will continue to keep the waters tumultuous for years and decades to come.

Disparate impact hangs by a legal thread in the Supreme Court; the concern lies in the effects that the current combination of Justices will have on (specifically) discrimination laws. Justice Kennedy was the only conservative justice who voted to preserve ‘the standard’ during a crucial housing case in 2015, stating that the courts should not just pay attention to intentional racism (disparate treatment), but also on the disparate impact as well, and the damage caused by “unconscious prejudices and disguised animus”. [5] The other four conservative justices, however, dissented from the majority opinion in that case, elevating cause for concern as Justice Kavanaugh enters the court. Without Justice Kennedy, and with Kavanaugh’s history of skepticism regarding disparate impact [6], discrimination law could be in real jeopardy.

Until that 2015 case, no Supreme Court ‘majority opinion’ [7] had ever described disparate impact liability as an attempt to address the negative effects of unconscious prejudice. Therefore, the importance of this case was monumental; it reframed “the jurisprudential debate about why we have disparate impact causes of action under Title VII (which prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, and sex) or the ADEA (which prohibits discrimination on the basis of age). It recognizes that disparate impact liability might be useful in those cases because unconscious biases might be keeping minorities and women back even in the absence of conscious discriminatory intent. Moreover, while Kennedy’s majority opinion stated that such unconscious prejudices escape ‘easy classification’ as disparate treatment, it does not say that they could never qualify as such. To the contrary, Kennedy puts smoking out unconscious prejudices under the heading of ‘uncovering discriminatory intent’.

This is particularly important because disparate impact is not cognizable under the Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause. Since 1976, the Supreme Court has said that discriminatory intent is required. However, as Justice Samuel Alito pointed out in [this] case, disparate impact can be used as evidence of discriminatory intent, even in constitutional cases. So to the extent that unconscious bias counts as discriminatory intent, the kinds of cases cognizable under the Equal Protection Clause may expand as well.” [8]

So what does it all mean?

Essentially, the concern is that based on their records, Kavanaugh, along with the other four conservative judges, could begin to dismantle current discrimination laws such as the Fair Housing Act by dramatically narrowing the definition of discrimination, starting with disparate impact. Without the belief in and protection of disparate impact, Supreme Court rulings can necessitate that proof of intentional discrimination (disparate treatment) is the only form of court-recognized discrimination.

George Washington University Sociologist Gregory Squires said that with this shift in the Supreme Court, “we [will] probably see less movement in the direction of more diverse communities, and increasing incidents of discrimination," and that "housing providers [will] feel empowered to do things they wouldn't do today with disparate impact." [9]

Additionally, the Trump Administration has demonstrated their resolve to question, even attack ‘the standard’; White House officials are considering the abolishment of the use of disparate impact, which will weaken federal rules against discrimination of women and people of color in areas of housing and education. An internal Justice Department memo directed senior civil rights officials to examine how changes or removals could be made to decades old ‘disparate impact’ regulations. Similar action is currently being taken at both the Education Department and the Department of Housing and Urban Development.[10]

Kristen Clarke, president and executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law stated that “disparate impact is a bedrock principle. Through the courts, we’ve been able to marshal data and use the disparate-impact doctrine as a robust tool for ferreting out discrimination.” Without the ability to use disparate impact within cases, systemic discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, sex, and religion would be left unchecked, pushing our laws and policy back into pre-civil rights era America.

Meckler and Barratt (2019) state that “much — but not all — of the disparate-impact law could be changed by the administration because the concept was incorporated through regulations, which administrations are free to change by following a formal process. A broad-based rewrite of regulations could affect areas such as transportation and environmental law, as well as education and housing. But it would be harder to make changes to voting and employment law, experts say, because the concept of disparate impact is overtly written into the underlying statute, not just the regulations.”

Plainly put, without being able to use disparate impact as a critical tool in discrimination cases, victims will have to be able to prove that their employer/landlord/school/etc intentionally discriminated against them, instead of judges being able to look at the ways in which these social and organizational systems engage in discriminatory practices systemically. Evidence that proves intentional discrimination is often extremely difficult to find; however, even if bias and discrimination is unintentional, organizations such as these should still be held accountable, or our society will never fully break free from the injustice of discrimination. Ajmel Quereshi, senior counsel with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, said that “most people don’t have access to what’s going on in somebody’s mind. Even if a decision was intentionally discriminatory, it’s going to be very difficult to prove.” [11] 

Without the ability to use disparate impact, many, if not most victims of discrimination won’t be able to successfully and legally fight against the oppressing entity in the court. 

Bottom Line

Thankfully our Democracy is set up so that not one singular branch of government is all-powerful; however, two of the three branches (and half of the third-the Senate) are currently controlled by Trump loyalists, which makes things all the more difficult. But we can fight back; it’s imperative that we become informed people. We cannot fight back against this administration and these injustices without knowledge of what is currently going on. As Martin Luther King Jr. taught us, We The People have power, and it’s up to us to use that power, to use our voices and make our will known to our government.

We cannot revert back to our antiquated, immoral, and discriminatory past. We cannot and will not go silently into the night.


[1] What are disparate impact and disparate treatment? Society of Human Resource Management
[2] Disparate Impact; Legal Dictionary
[3] The Fair Housing Act; U.S. Department of Justice
[4] Fair Housing Act; History
[5] Supreme Court 2015: The court acknowledges unconscious prejudice; Slate
[6] Report on the record of Supreme Court Nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh; Demos
[7] The term ‘opinion’ is used in law to refer to several types of writing done by the Justices. The ‘majority opinion’ is a judicial opinion agreed to by more than half of the members of the court. The Justice who authors the ‘majority opinion’ summarizes the opinion from the bench during a regularly scheduled session of the Court. Supreme Court of the United States
[8] Supreme Court 2015: The court acknowledges unconscious prejudice; Slate
[9] A new Supreme Court is poised to take a chunk out of MLK’s legacy; John Blake
[10] Trump administration considers rollback of anti-discrimination rules; Laura Meckler & Devlin Barrett
[11] Trump administration considers rollback of anti-discrimination rules; Laura Meckler & Devlin Barrett

#WCW Feminist Profile: Amy Poehler

Amy Poehler is absolutely one of my favorite human beings on the planet. She is not only hilarious, but kind, genuine, talented, empathetic, and one heck of an activist. Plus, she created and brought to life one of my all-time FAVORITE fictional characters, Leslie Knope. Amy is an incredible writer and one of the most hilarious comedians of all time. She is also the creator of Amy Poehler’s Smart Girls, an organization dedicated to helping young people cultivate their authentic selves. They emphasize intelligence and imagination over “fitting in.” [Visit their website here]

Amy is an ultra-successful writer and actress; she's been nominated for three Emmys for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series, two Golden Globe Awards, and one Screen Actors Guild Award. She is also an activist in women’s issues and serves as Ambassador for the Worldwide Orphans Foundation. “On screen and off, Amy believes in empowering women and girls everywhere. Her dedication to helping young women has gained her numerous accolades, including Glamour’s Woman of the Year. Through her digital series Smart Girls at the Party, Amy continues to acknowledge and support girls who are ‘changing the world by being themselves.’” 

As a woman working in government, Leslie Knope is one of my biggest heroes. As a woman, Amy Poehler is one of my biggest heroes. She is feminist AF and stands up for what she believes in, and dedicates her time to making her community, and the world, a better place. She’s written a wonderful autobiography, called Yes, Please! and has given (me) some of the best advice I’ve ever read. Amy Poehler is essentially my life coach (unbeknownst to her). So I thought I'd share some of her best advice with you, in this differently-styled Feminist Profile. Picking my top favorite pieces of advice was really difficult, but I managed to narrow it down to 15… you’re welcome! ;)

1. “Anybody who doesn’t make you feel good, kick them to the curb. And the earlier you start in your life, the better.”

She’s so right on target here. Sometimes we put up with awful things from people for various reasons. Maybe its lack of confidence or respect for ourselves, maybe it’s because we feel we owe that person for some reason, or maybe it’s because we don’t know how to stand up for ourselves. Whatever it is, follow Amy’s advice and give it up now. You deserve SO MUCH MORE THAN THAT. You deserve to be happy and you don’t need ANYONE in your life that makes you feel belittled, insignificant, ugly, stupid, sad, angry, etc. They aren’t worth it, and the people who are would never make you feel that way!

2. “No one looks stupid when they’re having fun.”

I love this. I’m not the type of person who embarrasses easily. In fact, I’m more likely to embarrass you for being seen with me. I love to goof off and have fun and some people just can’t handle that. Sure, there’s a time and a place, but the list of places you shouldn’t goof off is pretty small compared to the list of places you should. There was a brief moment in my life when I started really caring about what people thought and it was awful! I never had as much fun! I know a lot of people are afraid to let go because they don’t want to look stupid or embarrass themselves, but I say, who cares!? Embrace it! The fun you’ll have will be well worth it in the end, trust me.

3. “Continue to share your heart with people even if it’s been broken.”

Smart lady. This was something I’ve definitely struggled with in the past. It’s a natural reaction; when we get hurt, all of our walls go up as our heart tirelessly prevents itself from having to endure that pain again. It’s a defense mechanism that’s really sophisticated and efficient and great at what it does. Learning how to lower your guard, to break down those walls and let people in again is truly difficult. But it’s absolutely vital. And totally worth the hard work it takes to get there again.

4. “Rooting for other people’s failure does get in the way of your success.”

Classy, classy woman. We should always be uplifting each other instead of dragging people down. There’s enough of that going on in the world, we don’t need to be doing it to each other too. I’m a firm believer that what you put out into the world always comes back to you.

5. “You can’t do it alone. As you navigate through the rest of your life, be open to collaboration. Other people and other people’s ideas are often better than your own. Find a group of people who challenge and inspire you, and spend a lot of time with them, and it will change your life. No one is here today because they did it on their own.”

Sometimes you want to go at it alone because you feel like if you ask for help, you lose a little of the reward. It might feel like you don’t deserve the product if you had help with the development or maybe you might feel like you don’t want to share credit with anyone else because IT’S YOUR BABY and you’ve put your heart and a lot of hard work into it. I know I’ve felt that way before. But asking for help doesn’t mean any of these things. In fact, success is rarely accomplished by doing things alone. Ask for help, take other peoples’ opinions and ideas into consideration and create something beautiful and amazing together!

6. “Taking risks and making choices is what makes life so exciting.”

I used to be such a free spirit; I never thought that taking risks would be something I’d EVER struggle with. But when you get burned badly, when you break into thousands of pieces and you spend so many awful days trying to put yourself back together, you most often end up overcompensating by playing it safe. As mentioned before, those walls come up to prevent anymore heartache, but more often than not, they actually deprive us of truly experiencing happiness. Sure, we may feel safe when we don’t take risks, but like every cheesy Lifetime movie says, life isn’t about playing it safe. When we have something to lose, only then do we experience life at its fullest.

7. “Great people do things before they’re ready. They do things before they know they can do it…doing what you’re afraid of, getting out of your comfort zone, taking risks like that—that is what life is.”

BE BRAVE. When something scares me, I make myself do it (within reason). Obviously some things are incredibly dangerous and possibly detrimental to your health/job/life, and in those circumstances do not ignore your gut feelings! But with everything else, try things you wouldn’t normally try, eat things you wouldn’t normally eat, experience something you’ve been strangely interested in, but too afraid to do your whole life! Be uncomfortable, be afraid, but just do it!

8. “I get worried for young girls sometimes; I want them to feel that they can be sassy and full and weird and geeky and smart and independent, and not so withered and shriveled.”

If Amy is anything, she’s real. I love how empowering she is for women. I feel like she’s that one friend who’s always your cheerleader, no matter what. With everything she’s accomplished, she’s really pushing the envelope in a male dominated field. AND I LOVE THAT ABOUT HER. She practically IS feminism.

9. “Try to keep your mind open to possibilities and your mouth closed on matters that you don’t know about. Limit your always and your nevers.”

Pretty good advice if you ask me! Keeping an open mind allows us to continually grow and challenge ourselves. And before casting an opinion or making up our mind about something, we should learn about it first.

10. “The earlier you learn that you should focus on what you have and not obsess about what you don’t have, the happier you will be.”

When does Amy NOT look happy? The answer is NEVER. She’s someone that you can totally trust taking advice on happiness from. Most of us would agree with her here if we were asked, but sometimes we lose sight of these simple but true principles. It’s so easy to get wrapped up in the world. We work so hard to obtain what we want out of life that we sometimes forget to actually live it. Take a step back, re-evaluate yourself, your priorities, your plans, and make sure that what you’re doing is going to make you happy while reaching your goals. We can’t bank on living life once we’ve achieved them; we have to live it in the moment. We have to be in the present while looking forward to the future and not forgetting the past. We have to find happiness with what we have and who we are at that very moment.

11. “There’s power in looking silly and not caring that you do.”

This, I LOVE. Forget everyone else. Live your life the way you feel is best and don’t worry about what others think. If you’re happy, block everyone else out. And if you can’t help but be worried about them, just remember, confidence is the key. People won’t question you if you don’t let them.

12. “Sometimes painful things teach us lessons that we didn’t think we needed to know.”

It’s all about perspective. We don’t have to like the painful things in life, but we can accept them for shaping us into the people we are and will be. It’s important to learn to look on the bright side of things. And if that doesn’t work, then let’s look at the funny side of things.

13. “It’s just about honoring the fact that, yeah, I should be writing, producing, directing. I should be believing that the world is mine to have.”

BELIEVE IN YOURSELF. Self confidence is the key that unlocks your true potential. Once you have that belief, you are strong, powerful, and the world is yours for the taking.

14. “When you do talk about yourself or to yourself and you have that tape running in your head about yourself, try to picture you are talking to your own daughter or your younger sister, because you would tell your younger sister or your daughter that she is beautiful and you wouldn’t be lying, because she is. And so are you.”

We need to treat ourselves better, that’s for sure. We are our biggest critics and sometimes our worst enemy. We cannot truly be happy until we love ourselves.

15. “You deserve love and you’ll get it.”

And last but not least, be patient and believe that good things will come your way. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying to sit idly by like a damsel in distress waiting for your Prince Charming to come rescue you from the Evil Queen, because let’s get one thing straight, we don’t need a man to save us, we can do it ourselves. But life requires a certain amount of patience. Go after what you want and don’t settle for anything less. You deserve it. And you’ll get it.

Empowered Women EMPOWER Women!

In mainstream feminism we talk about “empowering women” in a pretty generic way. We see the slogan “Empowered Women Empower Women!” on t-shirts, pins, buttons, posters at rallies, etc., but what does it really mean? And how do we actually DO it??

The United Nations Population Fund states that “the empowerment and autonomy of women and the improvement of their political, social, economic and health status is a highly important end in itself. In addition, it is essential for the achievement of sustainable development…Achieving change requires policy and program actions that will improve women's access to secure livelihoods and economic resources, alleviate their extreme responsibilities with regard to housework, remove legal impediments to their participation in public life, and raise social awareness through effective programs of education and mass communication.”

Before we get too far, because I feel like in order to have successful and informed dialogue, we need to be operating on the same definitions of key terms. Empowerment, in this article, will refer to: the process of becoming stronger and more confident, especially in controlling one's life and claiming one's rights. Autonomy refers to: self-government or self-direction; being autonomous is acting on motives, reasons, or values that are one's own; freedom from external control or influence; independence. I believe the UN hits its right on the nail here, though without drawing serious attention to it: Empowerment comes from autonomy. 

Though I don’t think there is any one definition of an ‘empowered woman’, I think that there are many characteristics of empowered women that I have observed, whether in myself or in others. Empowered women feel free and motivated to make decisions about themselves and their lives without conforming [or perhaps in spite of] the demands of society; empowered women are conscious of the societal and cultural constraints that are placed upon them and actively fight to break these barriers down, to make choices on their own volition, and adhere to their own moral code of conduct. I think being an ‘empowered woman’ in a processes, and perhaps fluid in nature; I think even the most ‘empowered woman’ can sometimes let her ‘empowerment’ be stripped from her, can experience their empowerment falter based on experiences or circumstances they face, or even lose sight of our own power.

As empowered women, I think we have a moral charge to help empower other women. We have unique experiences, not just physically, but mentally, emotionally, spiritually, from others; these unique experiences provide us specific, additional, and stronger insight and understanding into the lives of other women. In the histories of the world, the empowerment of women has almost solely been provided or nurtured from/by other women. Power has almost never been given to women freely, rather something they have had to fight for, sometimes (many, many times) to the death, with countless women sacrificing themselves for their cause. Historically speaking, power, including personal power, societal, political, and legal, has been taken back by women, not given freely by the patriarchal domain. [That has included men that have fought alongside our sisters in the cause, but make no mistake that women have the amount of power (which is still unequal power) that they have because THEY have FOUGHT for it, DEMANDED it, and NOT GIVEN UP until they have received it.]

I raise up my voice – not so I can shout, but so those without a voice can be heard… We cannot succeed when half of us are held back.
– Malala Yousafzai

I feel like we’ve talked about the first question pretty well; I think we understand what it means to be an empowered woman. Now let’s get to the goods. HOW do we empower women??

1. Education

The U.N. stated that “education is one of the most important means of empowering women with the knowledge, skills and self-confidence necessary to participate fully in the development process”. Girls and women need opportunities for education and skill building. As a woman in STEM, this is very important to me. Girls’ interests or capabilities many times go unnurtured in fields of science, technology, math, and engineering. Studies show that the biggest time for girls’ interests to be supported in these areas is middle school. After school programs, summer camps, and social-educational groups can be a huge advantage to girls and help them to keep and pursue their interests in STEM. Beyond STEM programs, girls and women need to be encouraged to seek education, and supported in their educational efforts (not just by scholarship and/or child care assistance, but also with opportunities).

2. Mentorship

Perhaps one of the greatest things we can do as women is to mentor other women. This is HUGE for helping to advance women in all areas of work and volunteering. As I’ve stated before, women hold very unique experiences, and it’s vital to the success of other women, that we mentor and teach each other. Mentorship has shown to be so statistically significant when it comes to women's success at work, that it boggles my mind that there isn’t more push or efforts to do so. Women need to stand together and help each other.

3. Being Vulnerable and Transparent

Women have an innate tendency to compare ourselves to each other. I believe this is something that has been socially bred into us, but despite what the causes are, we know that it is a behavior women engage in more than men. (Innumerous psychological and sociological studies have been devoted to understanding this very phenomena) Being transparent and willing to be vulnerable about our experiences is crucial to empowering other women. Our experiences are tremendously powerful. We can harness this power and use to inspire the women around us; that kind of inspiration and power will spread like wildfire.

4. Encouragement

We need to be reliable support systems to each other. Our relationships with other women can be monumental in helping to shape our own empowerment, our own confidence, and our own self-love. Be a woman who stands up for other women, who encourages them to be strong, resilient, and make their dreams come true. Positivity is perhaps the strongest weapon against the dark perils of the world. Make sure you’re encouraging those around you, and you will also build yourself in the process.

5. Listen

Maybe this is one of the most important ones, I don’t know…I keep thinking that as I write each one of these! WE NEED TO LISTEN TO OTHER WOMEN. Women have been silenced, talked over, and ignored for so long, that people (including women) just accept it as part of everyday life, as a part of culture. THIS. IS. NOT. OKAY. It is absolutely IMPERATIVE that we listen, truly LISTEN, to each other. Speaking up or talking about certain things takes loads of courage and bravery; when women do have that courage to tell you about their experiences, you should actively listen to them. And RESPECT them. We’ve just gone through yet another horrible example in politics about when we silence women or ignore their experiences. LISTEN. BELIEVE WOMEN. BELIEVE SURVIVORS.

6. Help to Break Barriers

Intersectional feminism focuses on how all of us have a myriad of experiences and backgrounds and aspects of ourselves that come together to create the whole person of who we are. Whether that’s our race or ethnicity, socioeconomic status, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, able-bodiedness, or our physical/mental/emotional health, we have many things that combined together to make us who we are. We first have to understand that all these intersect, and then we need to acknowledge our privilege, wherever it may be. Next, we need to think about these intersectionalities when listening or helping others, and ACTIVELY work to help the women around us break through these barriers.

7. Invest in Women

Time to put our money/resources/power where our mouth is. We need to INVEST in women, whether that’s financially (supporting women-owned/women-lead businesses, donating to scholarship funds for women, etc.), emotionally (supporting each other by being confidants, ears to listen, shoulders to cry on), with our time (mentorship, teaching, helping), with our contacts and resources, and especially with our own power (utilizing our power/privilege/platform to hand the mic over other women of different backgrounds to share their experiences and needs). We need to invest in each other!

8. SUPPORT

Much of what I’ve talked about above has been related to support. But it’s so important, I’m giving it its own section. When we support each other, we create powerful bonds of alliance, friendship, and respect. There are many ways we can show our support for other women, and many of them include all the numbers above, but also include things like showing up at marches, rallies, and town halls, participating in activism, wearing a certain color to support a certain cause, etc. We can make the effort to stand up for women, wherever we may be, in whatever ways we can. We can offer our talents, our means, and our resources to helping those women around us become confident, educated, successful women!

#WCW Feminist Profile: Dr. Christine Blasey Ford

Dr. Christine Blasey Ford is a psychology researcher at Stanford University School of Medicine and a professor of psychology at Palo Alto University. She has worked on Stanford University School of Medicine Collaborative Clinical Psychology Program and specializes in statistical modeling.

As an undergrad, she received her Bachelor’s degree in Experimental Psychology from University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, her Master’s in Clinical Psychology from Pepperdine University, and her PhD in Educational Psychology from University of Southern California; her 1995 dissertation was entitled Measuring Young Children's Coping Responses to Interpersonal Conflict. She also earned an additional master's degree in Epidemiology, with a focus on the subject of Biostatistics, from Stanford University School of Medicine.

Dr. Ford began teaching at Stanford University in 1988, and also currently at Palo Alto University, in which she participates in educational programs with the Stanford University School of Medicine as a member of a consortium group with Palo Alto University. She teaches courses in psychometrics, research methodology, and statistics. Additionally, Dr. Ford has consulted for several pharmaceutical companies, worked as the director of biostatistics at Corcept Therapeutics, and collaborated with FDA statisticians.

Ford is an expert within her field, and widely published in a vast array of topics.

Helena Chmura Kraemer, a Stanford professor emeritus in biostatistics who has co-authored a book and several articles with Dr. Ford, states that Ford "specializes in designing statistical models for research projects in order to make sure they come to accurate conclusions". She has written numerous academic/peer reviewed articles published in academic journals on topics such as depression, child abuse, and trauma. In 2015 she co-authored a book titled How Many Subjects? Statistical Power Analysis in Research. Additionally, in 2016 she published her research in the academic journal Behavior Therapy, which explores the social impact of hiding one’s sexual orientation. Psychologist William Gibson from the American Psychological Association stated that Dr. Ford’s research "demonstrates that issues of identity have relevance to mental health outcomes in ways that much of previous work misses”.

Dr. Ford is a subject matter expert in trauma. She is an accomplished and successful Psychologist, researcher, and professor. Amongst these amazing and noteworthy accomplishments, Dr. Ford is a wife and a mother to two sons. 

She is also a survivor of sexual assault.

I will not go into Dr. Ford’s story too much because she tells it herself in her compelling, heart-wrenching testimony at Judge Kavanaugh’s Senate hearing. But I will go into the events leading up to the hearing and the subsequent after effects of the Confirmation Vote.

In early July, 2018, Dr. Ford wrote to her representative, Congresswoman Anna Eshoo, after seeing Judge Kavanaugh’s name on President Trump’s shortlist of nominees for Supreme Court Justice. In her letter, Dr. Ford detailed her experiences with Judge Kavanaugh as a teen, that he had sexually assaulted her at a party in high school, and asked to be kept anonymous, adamantly expressing her worry that her identity would become public. She stated that she was “terrified”. And for good reason, which we’ll talk about later. Congresswoman Eshoo found Ford’s account to be credible, and met with Dr. Ford, after which, they decided to take the issue to Senator Dianne Feinstein, their Californian Senator and ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, who was due to deliberate Kavanaugh nomination. Dr. Ford’s letter to Senator Feinstein accounted her sexual assault by Judge Kavanaugh when both of them were still in high school in Maryland. She then asked her story be confidential.

The next month, in August, Dr. Ford took a polygraph administered by a former FBI agent, who found her statement and accounts to be truthful. On September 13, in order to protect Dr. Ford’s identity, Senator Feinstein sent the letter Ford had written her to the FBI, who redacted Ford’s name, and sent the letter to the White House as an update to Kavanaugh’s background check. The White House, in turn, sent the letter to each member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

On September 16, because the media circus had begun to identify Dr. Ford as the accuser, Dr. Ford made her identity public. Dr. Ford then testified at Judge Kavanaugh's hearing, where she recounted the events and subsequent impact those events have had and continue to have on her life. She was strong. She was brave. She was courageous. And even though it took everything out of her, even though she faced mountainous ridicule and hateful vitriol from GOP and many of the Republican Senators and party members (who called her a liar, a political pawn in the Democrats arsenal to take over), SHE SPOKE HER TRUTH. She stood up, she spoke out, and she PUT HERSELF OUT THERE. She did so because she believed it was her “civic duty” to say something; she could not live with herself knowing what kind of person he truly is and not say anything, given the importance of the lifetime appointment as a Justice in the Supreme Court.

I am so grateful for Dr. Ford for being willing, and courageous, and brave enough to share her story, a story that so many, innumerous, women share. Dr. Ford is a hero. She has not wavered, even after the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES HARSHLY, DISGUSTINGLY, AND DISTASTEFULLY MOCKED HER ON NATIONAL TELEVISION, IN FRONT OF MILLIONS OF PEOPLE. She has not wavered under the accusatory and malicious attacks from media and talking heads and Republican Senators. She has not wavered after receiving death threats to her and her family, who STILL cannot return home because of the intensity and extent to which those threats were made.

She has not wavered, even though the man that she knows, in 100% certainty because it is burned into her brain (AND SHE KNEW HIM BEFORE THE ASSAULT), sexually assaulted her at a party in high school when she was fifteen and he was seventeen.

SHE. HAS. NOT. WAVERED.

Dr. Ford’s resiliency has inspired thousands of women to speak up about their experiences (and several other women who have similar experiences with Kavanaugh), to speak their truths, to stand up to their assaulters, to take control of their narrative and fight back.

Dr. Ford has given hope to so many survivors and has demonstrated that survivors are not alone. Dr. Ford is a feminist icon because she has, inadvertently, ushered in a new wave of resistance fighters.

WE BELIEVE YOU. WE STAND WITH YOU.

WOMEN WILL NOT FORGET. 

The Importance of Rallies, Marches, Walkouts, Sit-Ins, and Other Non-Violent Protests

"Non-violent resistance (NVR) is the practice of achieving goals such as social change through symbolic protests, civil disobedience, economic or political non-cooperation, Satyagraha, or other methods, while being nonviolent. This type of action highlights the desires of an individual or group that feels that something needs to change to improve the current condition. It is largely but wrongly taken as synonymous with civil resistance. Each of these terms—nonviolent resistance and civil resistance—has different connotations and commitments.” 

“Civil resistance is political action that relies on the use of nonviolent resistance by civil groups to challenge a particular power, force, policy or regime. Civil resistance operates through appeals to the adversary, pressure and coercion: it can involve systematic attempts to undermine the adversary's sources of power, both domestic and international. Forms of action have included demonstrations, vigils and petitions; strikes, go-slows, boycotts and emigration movements; and sit-ins, occupations, and the creation of parallel institutions of government. The phenomenon of civil resistance is often associated with the advancement of democracy.”

Perhaps some of the greatest examples of nonviolent resistance and civil resistance have been at the hands of leaders and people like Martin Luther King Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, Henry David Thoreau, Leo Tolstoy, Nelson Mandela, Alice Paul, Rosa Parks, amongst many, many others. From the Freedom Riders, to the Marchers at Salem, to the #NeverAgain and #EnoughisEnough protests (Marjory Stoneman Douglas student activists), we have seen great political and societal change from these nonviolent forms of demonstration.

Let’s take a quick look at some historical NVR’s:

Exhibit A:
1848-1920: Unites States: Women’s Suffrage was a political movement that spanned over a century, where women protested in order to receive the right to suffrage, or the legal right to vote, in the United States. This movement emerged from the broader movement of women’s rights; in 1848, the Seneca Falls Convention (the first women’s rights convention) passed a resolution in favor of women’s suffrage. It was a long battle, and included many marches and much protest, but eventually, in 1920, the 19th Amendment to the Constitution was passed, giving women the right to vote.

Exhibit B:
1823-1829: Ireland: One of the first mass-membership political movements of Europe, the Catholic Association was founded by Daniel O'Connell to use non-violent means to push the British government to pass Catholic emancipation, which culminated in the passing of the Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829 by the government of the Duke of Wellington

Exhibit C:
1819: England: Peterloo Massacre: Famine and chronic unemployment, coupled with the lack of suffrage in northern England, led to a peaceful demonstration of 60,000–80,000 persons, including women and children. The demonstration was organized and rehearsed, with a "prohibition of all weapons of offence or defense" and exhortations to come "armed with no other weapon but that of a self-approving conscience". Cavalry charged into the crowd, with sabers drawn, and in the ensuing confusion, 15 people were killed and 400–700 were injured.

Exhibit D:
1955-1968: United States: The Civil Rights Movement included tactics of nonviolent resistance, such as bus boycotts, Freedom Rides, sit-ins, marches, and mass demonstrations, were used during the Civil Rights Movement. This movement succeeded in bringing about legislative change, making separate seats, drinking fountains, and schools for African Americans illegal, and obtaining full Voting Rights and open housing. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s vision of "the Beloved Community" was inspired by his leading Christians in nonviolent resistance.

Exhibit E:
1968: Worldwide: The protests that raged throughout 1968 were for the most part student-led. Worldwide, campuses became the front-line battle grounds for social change. While opposition to the Vietnam War dominated the protests, students also protested for civil liberties, against racism, for feminism, and the beginnings of the Ecology movement can be traced to the protests against nuclear and biological weapons during this year. 

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said that “nonviolence is a powerful and just weapon. Indeed, it is a weapon unique in history, which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who wields it. It is a sword that heals.” I’ve been thinking a lot about the innumerable wise words of Dr. King. Coretta Scott King, an author, activist, and civil rights leader (and wife of Dr. King) stated that “nonviolence is the only credible response to the violence we’re seeing around the world.” Many people question what the purpose of walk-outs, sit-ins, and protests are, saying that they don’t actually do anything. I would whole-heartedly disagree. I think there is great power in the collective, in unifying people under a cause, and standing with each other and supporting one another.

The example I often give when responding to the question “do you think that just wearing a specific color assigned to your protest day and showing up for a rally/march really matters?” is that of breast cancer awareness. Wearing a pink ribbon or pink clothing during Breast Cancer Awareness Month is a pretty standard and accepted social display of support. No one ever thinks twice about it. I’ve never seen anyone complain or riot about people walking for breast cancer awareness, raising funds for victims and survivors, or posting pictures on social media wearing pink for #breastcancerawareness. 

BUT WHEN IT COMES TO SEXUAL ASSAULT, THEY ALL COME OUT OF THE WOODWORK.

I cannot even comprehend the amount of backlash I saw and received for wearing black in support of Dr. Ford and ALL sexual assault survivors on our day of protest last week. I mean, literally, so many people blasted me on Facebook. I was truly dumbfounded and appalled. It rocked me, to my core. What was the difference? You have a victim, who took a polygraph test about her assault and showed ZERO signs of lying, who KNEW her assulter before she was assaulted by him, and spoke out about it when this person was being interviewed for a lifetime appointment to the highest COURT in the USA. And when millions of people want to stand up and stand with her and victims like her, wear black to unify together and draw attention to the issue, people really want to degrade all these women, say horrible things about them, disregard their democratic showing of protest and make them feel like trash?? Really?? 

So much of what I’ve seen and read these last couple weeks makes me sick. I am disgusted, appalled, outraged, and disheartened by the last of empathy and understanding and support of victims and survivors. But I (we) cannot let this stop us from using our voices, from standing up for our beliefs, from supporting each other because we fear the repercussions of doing so. THIS IS NOT FOR NOTHING. THIS IS NOT IN VAIN. What we’re doing is IMPORTANT. IT MATTERS. IT MAKES A DIFFERENCE. Even if that difference doesn’t come about quickly or visually, it matters to the millions of people who’ve experienced sexual assault, to know that WE BELIEVE THEM, that we support them and stand with them and will fight for them.

People make the mistake of thinking that the only goal of protests and nonviolent resistance is to reform law and change practices. While this is a main goal, of course, it is not the ONLY goal. We stand, we sit, we march, we chant, FOR THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN AFFECTED BY THESE TRAUMAS. 

THIS IS NOT FOR NOTHING. 

THIS IS NOT IN VAIN. 

THIS MATTERS.

THIS IS IMPORTANT.

THIS DOES MAKE A DIFFERENCE.

To All My Activists & SJW: TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF. #SELFCARE

Social Justice Warriors get a lot of flak out there. Many people see the “Social Justice Warrior” as a product of liberal-arts-school-brainwashing. You name it, I’ve heard it. Not just from older individuals, but even peers who don’t identify with what ‘social justice warriors’ typically identify with politically. As an activist, both in the government and non-profit sectors, I’m on the receiving end of a lot of this. People diminish the work you do, usually with hostility in my experience, because they don’t understand it or because they don’t want to. This post isn’t for them. This post is for all my sisters and brothers out there fighting for equality and justice and social/political reform.
Recent times have been trying, to say the least. The last two years have felt like Groundhog Day in a torture chamber. [This is not a post about Trump. Frankly, I cannot possibly summon the amount of emotional stamina to post about him right now.] This is a post for all those people with boots on the ground, who are part of grassroots activism, who volunteer, who attend rallies and marches and other forms of nonviolent protests, who strive to make a difference within your own circle. This is for all my social justice warriors out there who do so much work, who give so much of themselves every day, and never get any acknowledgement.

Here’s the thing. The last two weeks have been very difficult, for many of us. Most of the women I know, and including myself, have experience with sexual harassment and sexual assault. This issue is extremely close to home. As activists, we utilize our experiences and the experiences of those around us as fuel to power ourselves, our machines. Our experiences are like coal, burning in our hearts, boiling in our guts, producing steam that runs through our bloodstreams to power our generator and create energy. Being an activists requires accessing and using our emotional experiences on a daily basis, which can be an extremely daunting task, especially during these times of heightened duress.

And the past couple weeks have been just that. Heinous. In my speaking out in support of Dr. Ford and against Judge Kavanaugh, I have been on the receiving end of much vitriol and virulence. As an outspoken activist, this is a burden, an awful side effect, of what I do. Knowing this, and willingly taking it on, does not make it any easier. At the start of all this, I was full of righteous indignation at the mistreatment of Dr. Ford. But wave after wave of disgusting comments, news segments, and social media posts...my fire was beginning to burn out. This issue is so close to home, that it felt as if everything that being said to/towards/about Dr. Ford was also being said about me, also being said about women that I know and love.

This experience was extremely damaging. Again, as an activist, I am used to these feelings of sadness, disheartenment, of seeing inequality and injustice, and experiencing immense sympathy and empathy; I am used to channeling these feelings into action, into fire and steam and energy. But this time was different. This time was reminiscent of November 8th, 2016. This time felt like a new rock bottom, even though we thought we were already there.

My sadness and anger at the injustice and mistreatment of a victim of sexual assault morphed; I began feeling depressed. I began to feel resentful of the people that I know, who’d expressed beliefs and thoughts about this situation that I didn’t agree with. I began to feel hopeless. That’s a word I do not use frequently. Disheartened, baffled, appalled, angry, outraged, definitely. But hopeless…hopeless is not a word I use on the reg, nor do I use it lightly. Hopeless resembles parts of my life when I dealt with depression, when I dealt with life-altering experiences and the darkness of being sucked into a metaphorical black hole.

And after seeing the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA MOCK A VICTIM OF SEXUAL ASSAULT IN FRONT OF MILLIONS OF PEOPLE [thousands of which laughed and cheered in the background] MADE ME FEEL HOPELESS. It also made me feel so disgusted at humanity that I couldn’t eat. I was nauseous. I was beyond hurt- I was obliterated. 

The past couple days I have felt nothing but hopeless.

As a person who deals with anxiety on a daily basis, I could feel my anxiety pumping at a higher frequency. My hands were shaking for days on end. My chest felt fluttery, my blood like a live-wire under my skin. I was so anxious, and so depressed, and so utterly heartbroken, that I just powered off. I couldn’t deal with it anymore. For three nights in a row, after work I just went home and did nothing, because I couldn’t do anything. I felt hollow. I couldn’t stop feeling like at any moment I would implode. The feeling and level of anxiety that I normally felt right before a panic attack was constant. I couldn’t sleep. Those of you with anxiety or sleeping disorders know that feeling well. I went to work, at a job that I love and at which I feel fulfilled every day, and felt like crying the whole time. And I did at times. I cried in private moments of despair and grief, for not just past experiences, and just for what Dr. Ford was going through, but for what all survivors have gone through, for the world that we live in, and knowledge of the world we could live in.

I watched Tina Fey’s “sheetcaking” sketch on SNL’s Weekend Update many times. I read posts of others feeling the same way, I talked with friends and coworkers feeling the same things, but still felt empty inside. On an off-chance, a random thought that occurred to me in a deep hour of despair last night, I tweeted one of my favorite activists, Sophia Bush, and asked her what she does as an activist to stay positive and keep fighting. I know she must get a lot of tweets, so I didn’t expect anything in return. Maybe another social justice warrior, another activist would see it and respond with their tips and tricks to staying in the game when you feel like you have nothing left to give. To my utter surprise/relief/joy, she responded this morning. What she said was this: 

It was such a good reminder for me, it something I definitely needed to hear. TAKE A DAY OFF. In my past studies in psychology, they used the old adage “you can’t pour from an empty cup. Take care of yourself first.” Self-care is so important, and it’s vital to understand what self-care your body and soul needs, because none of us are the same!

Dr. Barbara Markway states, in an article titled “Seven Types of Self-Care Activities for Coping with Stress,” that “when we’re stressed, self-care is often the first thing to go. Why is this?

1. Our brains go into fight-or-flight mode and our perspective narrows. We don’t see we have options—options for coping with stress and making ourselves feel better.

2. We’re so busy trying to solve problems that we’re stuck in “doing mode”—trying to get more and more done—when switching to “being mode” may be just the break we need.

3. We may not have a “go to” list of self-care activities. Self-care has to become a habit, so that when we’re dealing with stress, we remember that, “Hey, I need to take care of myself in this situation.” And, you need a variety of activities to try—if one doesn’t work, you can switch to another.

Fortunately, there are several pathways to self-care, and none of them need be difficult or take a lot of planning:

SENSORY

When you feel stressed and need a calm mind, try focusing on the sensations around you—sights, smells, sounds, tastes, touch… This will help you focus on the present moment, giving you a break from your worries.

Breathe in fresh air.

Snuggle under a cozy blanket.

Listen to running water.

Sit outdoors by a fire-pit, watching the flames and listening to the night sounds.

Take a hot shower or a warm bath.

Get a massage.

Cuddle with a pet.

Pay attention to your breathing.

Burn a scented candle.

Wiggle your bare feet in overgrown grass.

Stare up at the sky.

Lie down where the afternoon sun streams in a window.

Listen to music.

PLEASURE

A great way to take care of yourself when you’re coping with stress is to engage in a pleasurable activity. Try one of these ideas.

Take yourself out to eat.

Be a tourist in your own city.

Garden.

Watch a movie.

Make art. Do a craft project.

Journal.

Walk your dogs.

Go for a photo walk.

MENTAL/MASTERY

You can also give yourself a boost by doing a task that you’ve been avoiding or challenging your brain in a novel way.

Clean out a junk drawer or a closet.

Take action (one small step) on something you’ve been avoiding.

Try a new activity.

Drive to a new place.

Make a list.

Immerse yourself in a crossword puzzle.

Do a word search.

Read something on a topic you wouldn’t normally.

SPIRITUAL

Getting in touch with your values—what really matters—is a sure way to cope with stress and foster a calm mind. Activities that people define as spiritual are very personal. Here are a few ideas:

Attend church.

Read poetry or inspiring quotes.

Light a candle.

Meditate.

Write in a journal.

Spend time in nature.

Pray.

List five things you’re grateful for.

EMOTIONAL

Dealing with our emotions can be challenging when we’re coping with stress. We tend to label emotions as “good” or “bad,” but this isn’t helpful. Instead:

Accept your feelings. They’re all ok. Really.

Write your feelings down. Here’s a list of feeling words.

Cry when you need to.

Laugh when you can. (Try laughter yoga.)

Practice self-compassion.

PHYSICAL

Coping with stress by engaging the body is great because you can bypass a lot of unhelpful mental chatter. It’s hard to feel stressed when you’re doing one of these self-care activites:

Try yoga.

Go for a walk or a run.

Dance.

Stretch.

Go for a bike ride.

Don’t skip sleep to get things done.

Take a nap.

SOCIAL

Connecting with others is an important part of self-care. This can mean activities such as:

Go on a lunch date with a good friend.

Calling a friend on the phone.

Participating in a book club.

Joining a support group.

It can also mean remembering that others go through similar experiences and difficulties as we do. We’re not alone. Simply acknowledging that we’re all part of this human experience can lessen isolation and lead to a calm mind. That’s the best self-care strategy I know.”

So please, take of yourselves! I’m working on taking care of myself too! And making self-care a true part of my daily routine!

“Rest and self-care are so important. When you take time to replenish your spirit, it allows you to serve others from the overflow. You cannot serve from an empty vessel.”

-Eleanor Brown

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/shyness-is-nice/201403/seven-types-self-care-activities-coping-stress