Every day a wide variety of headlines call out problems, injustices, and things in our world that quite simply *need* to change. Whether it’s age, gender, or sex discrimination; concern over our planet, strip-mining, drilling and the environment; or fighting for religious freedom, individual freedom, gun rights or the right to be free from gun violence; there are a million and one worthy causes. So many sometimes that it is easy to become overwhelmed and not know where to start or what to do.
While we have all heard the term *activist*, what exactly does that mean? Are activists militants? Can activists be a part of the organizations which they are struggling against? Can you talk to, reason with, or even understand an ardent activist? Prepare for the answers and the discussion in this show to surprise you!
April Young Bennet is a member of a patriarchal religion and she is also an activist who seeks to change certain rules within that organization. No, she did not throw the proverbial baby out with the bathwater! She loves many components of her religion and she is simply seeking to make it better. Stronger. More loving, acceptable and accessible to all. She seeks understanding and to foster a common ground with those who do not think as she does, and through her respectful conversation and the willingness to truly listen and understand, she is succeeding in places where others have not.
During her journey as an activist, she studied the lives of suffragists to inform her fight for gender equality within her religious community. She learned so much from this historical perspective that she began writing a book on the subject, *Ask a Suffragist: Stories and Wisdom from America’s First Feminists* which asks, “What can they teach us today?” The most striking message woven into the fabric of April’s extraordinary and intimate look at the women who first stood for women’s rights is the degree of support and sisterhood that they gave to each other.
This book is a close-hand look at Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucy Stone, Lucretia Mott, Sojourner Truth-and some whose names may not ring a bell…Maria W. Stewart, Antoinette Brown, Angelina and Sarah Grimké, Ernestine Potowska, and Elizabeth Blackwell, who were so filled with determination that they exerted the full force of their right to join together, and to change our nation.
The stories of these amazing women as they interweave with each other, is written in novelistic style, but is taken from their own letters, diaries and accounts. Learn what motivated them, what they had to overcome, how they navigated in a world dominated almost exclusively by men, how they collaborated with or had to endure life with their husbands, how they juggled activism and family, and how they effectively used the media to call forth and unite both men and women to their cause.
Grab your copy of Lora’s downloadable meditation, *Finding Your Passion & Purpose*, which is specifically designed to target the subconscious portion of the brain, to create fast, effective and fun changes, FREE, simply for being listeners! Click Here to Download.