COMMENTS FOR MARIANNE

Marianne, thank you from the bottom of my heart. Coming to Sister Giant was my 60th Birthday present to myself and I am leaving feeling fulfilled, motivated, excited and hopeful. Thank you for sharing your wisdom, faith, knowledge and friends with us. I will never be the same. Blessings!

The program was extraordinary – a thousand times better than the “great” I imagined when I signed up.

Would love to hear more of Will Witherspoon’s music. Where might i find that?

A deep bow of gratitude to you. Humbled. Frightened. Empowered. United.

Thank you from a 62 year old nurse married to a Presbyterian pastor from Wisconsin. Sister Giant 2017 was spectacular. The speakers were all high quality, inspired, informed, and thought provoking. Thank you for equipping us for the work ahead. Sending you peace, love, and gratitude from both of us.

Maria Popova recently featured this poem on her Brain Pickings–and a haunting recording by Amanda Palmer set to original new music by Jherek Bischoff–calling it an “anthem for our time.” https://www.brainpickings.org/2017/01/31/protest-poem-ella-wheeler-wilcox-amanda-palmer/

Wanted to share a blog post I write this morning, inspired by Sister Giant

A More Perfect Union

How is a democracy “of the people for the people by the people” protected and sustained? For the first time in my life, in its sixth decade, I am asking this question.

Leaving Sister Giant this weekend, I’m moved to go into deep meditation around questions surrounding our fragile and essential experiment in democracy. I learned more this weekend than I can possibly articulate, which I will be “metabolizing” over the next weeks. But what is most apparent to me is this:

Our democracy is sick. It is barely surviving on life support. And if we don’t act quickly and intelligently, it will be lost.

It is not Donald Trump that has caused this – he merely rode the incoming wave of forces that have been meticulously cultivated over many decades.

What do I do about it? Yes, like you I suspect, I’ve been signing petitions, marching, making donations to social justice organizations like the ACLU, and spending half my waking hours on Facebook and Twitter.

Marianne Williamson, in her seemingly infinite intelligence and wisdom, challenged us to go beyond the question of “what do I do?” To understand the original vision of our founding fathers. To understand the forces at work since that time that have sought to block human liberty, deny equality, and restrict human freedoms. And to consider our own complicity in these processes.

What? Me complicit? A nice, White upper middle class Jersey girl who minds her own business?

That’s exactly right – too much minding my own business. I was born into most advantages: a “very good” public school, a 5-bedroom home on one wooded acre, a swimming pool, and the “choice” to work at age 17 so that I could make more trips to the Monmouth Mall.

Growing up and as a young adult, I was “bored” by the topics of civics, history, and government. Music, math, science, psychology and religion were much more interesting to me. My Dad told me I could succeed at any career, be anything I wanted to be. So I ignored the subjects I thought were boring, abstaining from such courses in college and grad school. Even as I grew older, I paid ZERO attention to local politics, and little attention to national politics – I didn’t like the “negative energy” surrounding politics, and judged our public servants as “not intelligent enough” to be worthy of my attention and discourse – I’ll stick with my university crowd, thank you very much.

As the national divisions (red/blue, right/left) grew stronger in the 90’s, I felt the rift in my own extended family and grieved for the now strained relationships that were once sources of ease and love. I prayed that these family members would see reason and find their way back to the Christian-based values on which they had based their lives. I even indulged in the self-serving thought that older members of my family were in cognitive decline, causing their willingness to tolerate political leaders who promoted intolerance, homophobia, racism, and sexism while seeking to weaken gun safety laws and environmental protections.

My inclinations throughout my adult life have been to build family and community ties (shout out to the Oberlin community for the experience and utopian vision of what is possible). And yet, the communities I’ve sought to build and strengthen have been among like-minded, artistic, and “educated” people. I’ve never extended this focus beyond my own comfort zone or to the civic level – to everyone within a town or region, or to supporting and working for the laws that support a community life that sustains everyone.

It has never crossed my mind until now that democracy is fragile – perhaps its most fragile since the Civil War – and needs my care.

Since my life began, I have been a very lucky recipient of much that our democracy has offered – public education, free speech, freedom of travel and exploration, private property, economic security, safety, and a multicultural society. Other than voting every few years, and a few days of working to “get out the vote”, I have done nothing to care for our democracy. I have paid no attention to local or state politics. I’ve barely read bills that are up for vote. I’ve never attended a town hall or political meeting. In short, I was handed a functioning democracy as a child, and I have done nothing to care for it, keep it healthy, or protect it. I’ve assumed it would always “be here” for me.

My assumption died this past weekend. I am now one of many stepping forward to take care of this democracy we all share. I believe in the “more just and perfect union” and E Pluribus Unum as ideals to strive towards. I will care for our democracy as I care for my own health, my friends and loved ones, my creative work, and the sustainability of our earth. This is an essential foundation of my American life, an essential foundation of all our lives. Having confessed my sin of neglect, I will now work to make amends and do my part to assure the continuance of this precious democratic experiment.

Marianne, I am truly overwhelmed with gratitude and pride at what you brought to us this past weekend DC. It was nothing short of electrifying.- absolutely beautiful beyond all expectations. When speaking to others I refer to my experience at Sister Giant as attending “THE FIRST CONTINENTAL CONGRESS OF THE NEW AGE”. I woke up Sunday morning thinking – ‘Where can I hold a commuity meeting?’ For starters I will present a summary of SG at the monthly women’s group in my little metaphysical Church in DC. I am certain that all in attendance at SG will maintain the desire to reach out to our communities and spread the good news that we WILL make miracles happen. Together . Sending love to you, Derrick and your team for a magnificent job.

marianne, i need to say this to you: this weekend changed my perspective. in my personal life, i often feel that i am powerless to succeed at many things. i know this is simply a pattern developed throughout my life that can be overcome but it has been difficult. i see how this affects my feelings that trying to reverse the harm that is coming with this administration is well, hopeless. but this weekend was a gift from you and all the presenters. i found myself rising to the convictions that were being presented and feeling the presence of the multitude of others who are ready to put all their talents to work to make the change that we’d all like to see. i participated by live stream but i made sure to stay with the live presentation as if i were there. i clapped, i shouted, i laughed and sang with your audience and pretended i was there. thank you for this gift!

so far, i don’t see any information saying that you intend to sell dvds or cds of the conference. i’d just like to suggest that it would be a wonderful thing for others who, like myself, are a little lost in the overwhelm of where we are to be able to access the presentations.

and to echo another commenter’s comment–i appreciate that you provided such a stellar conference to the public for such a reasonable cost, both the live and livestream were extremely affordable. thank you marianne for everything!

The folks at Indivisible Guide give you the best practices, from former congressional staffers, for making Congress listen. You can download the guide at the website. https://www.indivisibleguide.com/

Mary I wold love to hear/read your summary you’re planning to present to your group. I feel I want to tell others but find Im at a loss for words. There was so much that my mind just isn’t able to condense what Sister Giant is all about. I know there is an “About” on the SG page but I am interested in hearing how an attendee would word it. If its convenient and you feel moved to share that would be great and if not then thats OK too 🙂

Mary, for the same reason as Becci, I would also love to hear/read any summary you put together. It could be so helpful for creating a group in my community (where none exists) for creating community/networkers to move forward in the many amazing ways Sister Giant has inspired, awakened and electrified (to quote you) us. I love your comment to Marianne!!
~ Mary Numen

Hello Marianne: Much gratitude for an engaging and enlivening weekend. Just what we needed!

I have been noodling for weeks on an approach to spiritual activism that is equal parts clear strategy (what I heard so many attendees longing for) and soul nourishment — something that can go the long haul in the resistance, fend off burnout, forge alliances across difference, and support the work of individual and collective transformation. Sister Giant helped crystallize these ideas for me. I’m now beta testing this small-group approach, which I’m calling KINDRED, with a tribe of friends in Minneapolis-St. Paul, and I have a couple of other friends doing their own groups in other states. I just created a gdoc PDF in case it might be helpful to others: https://drive.google.com/drive/u/3/folders/0B5Y39iY6M_0aRVhtZFo3aVd0SlE

Thanks again to you and everyone who helped make SG possible. I’m excited to see what will grow out of it!

I wish I could listen to this. As a Special Ed Instructional Assistant who works part-time at HomeGoods $50 = prohibitive. rats.

I’ve written an article, “The Top Ten Takeaways From Sister Giant,” that I thought I would share with everyone. http://drmichaelwayne.com/blog/the-top-10-takeaways-from-sister-giant/

Hi Marianne, Doris Russell here. I was at SisterGiant and enjoyed it very much. I paid the fifty dollars to access the video – but don’t know how to get into it. It says watch video replay, but nothing happens. thanks dorrussell@gmail.com