How are you?
This past week for me has been very snowy and cold. I’ve been busy and a bit emotional. But I’m hanging in there. Hope you are, as well.
In this email are a few things that may amuse, inspire or delight you.
And just a reminder that there is only a week left in our fundraiser to send Ismatu to college, more below.
Yesterday I published a new article on Linkedin & I’m extra proud of it:
Do you dismiss thoughts or ideas you can’t immediately put into a box?
Do you suppress your desires when you start wanting something that feels difficult, unattainable or impossible?
There’s another way to write or be creative…
Read my free article “Be Led By the Fire: Writing into Formless Creativity” here for free
Free Cowork Session
Distracted? Come join us to focus and get some work done together Last week I did recorded another cowork session:
See the replay of my free Cowork Session Here
Join our fundraiser to help Ismatu go to college:
I was on the phone in 2023 with an amazing young girl from Sierra Leone.
She told me that she used to be scared.
Ismatu is her name–
She said as a young, Muslim, indigenous girl, it was scary to visit communities where she knew no one.
But she wanted to talk to the women there.
She wanted to talk to them about traditions that hurt women like Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), and why it must stop.
Over 90% of women there have already gone through FGM.
She wants to change the cycle.
So even though it was scary and uncomfortable, Ismatu had a mission to help women and girls.
So she kept going. That fear did not stop her.
Where she is from 90% of women cannot read a sentence.
Not only did she finish high school,
but she won a regional high school debate on the topic,
“Why Girls Deserve an Education.”
We want to see her succeed.
We want to see her shine brighter.
We want to see a girl like her, blooming out of rough soil, show everyone in her country what girls can do.
We want to amplify her voice.
I am a part of a movement to support girls and women in Sierra Leone,
in a place where it is not unusual to marry girls as young as 8,
and to require FGM of all women.
It never heals right. It’s awful.
Over 50% of women are scared of their husbands.
Don’t get me started on the rates of women who believe violence is deserved.
Sexual assault of minors is so common,
it’s been declared a national emergency.
WE NEED A MOVEMENT OF CHANGE
What better person to lead a movement of change than a girl, like Ismatu?
Last year we raised $500 for Ismatu to go to college.
In January we raised over $300 for her college supplies. We are raising another $500 to help her pay for her second year of college,
and avoid dropping out.
Only 1% of women in Sierra Leone graduate college, and The deadline for her schools fees are Feb 28.
Have a spare $25 to donate? Anything you have to give is appreciated
Make a Small Donation so Ismatu goes to college.
Thanks for reading
