Make Trouble: Standing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding the Courage to Lead

Don't sit around and wait for the perfect opportunity to come along —find something and make it an opportunity.

Feminist is not a passive label; it means speaking out and standing up for women everywhere, and also for yourself. One woman calling out an injustice is powerful enough; when we raise our voices together, we can shake the status quo to its foundation.

It shouldn’t be up to women to dismantle the patriarchy, but we can’t sit around and hope someone else does it either. Feminist is not a passive label; it means speaking out and standing up for women everywhere, and also for yourself. One woman calling out an injustice is powerful enough; when we raise our voices together, we can shake the status quo to its foundation.

Here’s the headline: In the first year alone, women saved $ 1.4 billion on birth control pills. Today we’re at a thirty-year low for unintended pregnancy, a historic low in teen pregnancy, and the lowest abortion rate since Roe v. Wade. These facts are too often overlooked, even though this is one of the biggest public health success stories of the last century. It didn’t happen on its own—it happened in large part due to better and more affordable access to birth control.

My mother said often, “Life isn’t fair, but government should be.

The Low Road,” by Marge Piercy. Part of it goes like this: It starts when you care to act, it starts when you do it again after they said no, it starts when you say We and know who you mean, and each day you mean one more.

This is your life. It is the only one you get, so no excuses and no do-overs. If you make a mistake or fail at something, you learn from it, you get over it, and you move on. Your job is to be the very best person you can be, and to never settle for anything less.

With his face all scrunched up and twisted with anger, he looked just like Draco Malfoy in Harry Potter. Sometimes when someone is making an idiot of themselves, especially on live television, it’s just better to let them go ahead.

Once you start questioning authority, it’s hard to stop.

Walking into the hearing room, I checked my phone one last time. I had an incoming text from my friend Terry McGovern, who works in global and maternal health. Her message read, “Just remember to carry the rage of women through the centuries with you this morning!

If you’re not scaring yourself, you’re probably not doing enough.

Sometimes being a troublemaker can be pretty damn awesome. After all, it was one of the great troublemakers of all time, Emma Goldman, who said, “If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.

I don't know what my future holds, but I do know I've been fortunate enough to be a troublemaker my whole life.

Children learn not from what you tell them, but from what they see you do, how you spend your days and what you do with your life.

Often the work that’s most worthwhile seems the most intractable and impossible. But just because someone else hasn’t figured it out yet doesn’t mean you can’t. After all, if it was easy, someone else would be doing it. And in the meantime, at least I’m enjoying fighting the good fight.

And no matter what you do, never forget the basics: Provide name tags and food; start on time and end on time; have a next step; have fun. Remember, “If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.

Don’t wait for all the boats to get in the flotilla—just start moving. You may lose a few people, and others may join up along the way, but if you wait until everyone is 100 percent on board, you’ll never get going. At a certain point you have to quit talking about it and start doing it.

The truth is, anything worth doing has its challenges. And, yes, fighting for what you believe in can be discouraging, defeating, and sometimes downright depressing. But it can also be powerful, inspiring, fun, and funny—and it can introduce you to people who will change your life.

This is a once-in-a-lifetime moment to decide who we are—as individuals and as a country. Unless we want to be defined by a stream of divisive late-night tweets (not to name any names), we’re all going to have to be brave.

This is it—your only life—so whatever the question, the answer is yes. Don’t look back. Don’t hesitate.

Susan Stamberg from NPR, with her wonderfully curly hair and an enormous grin, walked up to Mom carrying her ubiquitous microphone. “How does this feel, Ann?” she shouted above the screaming delegates. Mom was not a sentimental person; life hadn’t afforded her that luxury. But at that moment she was overcome, teary-eyed, as Ferraro’s name was announced over the speakers. “I wasn’t sure I would ever live to see this day,” she said. “Finally, one of us.

There is a takeaway here for aspiring hell-raisers: We get only what we’re willing to fight for—nothing more and, I hope, nothing less.

In the first year alone, women saved $1.4 billion on birth control pills. Today we’re at a thirty-year low for unintended pregnancy, a historic low in teen pregnancy, and the lowest abortion rate since Roe v. Wade.

the average woman in America who wants kids spends five years pregnant or trying to conceive, and thirty years trying not to.

You may go somewhere else and you may make a lot of money,” she said, “but you will never receive the kind of gratification that you receive from looking someone in the eye who says, ‘Thank you for helping make my life better.

Whatever your fight, don’t be ladylike!

At every job, look for someone who can teach you something. Stay close to the ground, and remember that you’re never too big of a deal to knock on doors. Find something outside your job that brings you joy—don’t look up years later and realize you missed out on the things you love. Give your staff vacation days, play sports, travel. Doing this will make you a better person and a better organizer. Know that there’s no road map for social change—so keep making it up, don’t get stuck or tied down, and never turn down a new opportunity. And never ever hold yourself back from accepting a big job or a big chance.

Along the way I’ve picked up a few tips. Warren Buffett told me he always travels with his own pillow. Good advice. A navy blue suit never shows dirt, even if you get mistaken for a flight attendant every now and then. When someone tells you they’re praying for you, just say a polite “Thank you” and move on. After all, it can’t hurt, right? Calling home every night, no matter where you are or how late it is, helps. Even when Kirk is already asleep and I just get his voice mail I feel better. Try to know where the best ice cream is in any given airport terminal. A portable clothes steamer can be a lifesaver, since you can use it anywhere and don’t need an ironing board. (Believe me, it works—even in a public bathroom an hour before an event.) Sleep whenever you can, even if it’s for fifteen minutes on a flight. And never shy away from telling people what you do. You dispel myths, for others and yourself.

Provide name tags and food; start on time and end on time; have a next step; have fun. Remember, “If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.

Of course, getting people in a room is 20 percent of the work; the other 80 percent is having something meaningful for them to do after they walk out the door.