In All The Years I've Been A

How Many Therapists Does It Take To Change A Lightbulb? One, As Long As The Lightbulb Wants To Change.

Many Young Women Are Less Whole And Androgynous Than They Were At Age Ten. They Are More Appearance-conscious And Sex-conscious. They Are Quieter, More Fearful Of Holding Strong Opinions, More Careful What They Say And Less Honest. They Are More Likely To Second-guess Themselves And To Be Self-critical. They Are Bigger Worriers And More Effective People Pleasers. They Are Less Likely To Play Sports, Love Math And Science And Plan On Being President. They Hide Their Intelligence. Many Must Fight For Years To Regain All The Territory They Lost.

Girls Developed Eating Disorders When Our Culture Developed A Standard Of Beauty That They Couldn't Obtain By Being Healthy. When Unnatural Thinness Became Attractive, Girls Did Unnatural Things To Be Thin.

People Come Here Penniless But Not Cultureless. They Bring Us Gifts. We Can Synthesize The Best Of Our Traditions With The Best Of Theirs. We Can Teach And Learn From Each Other To Produce A Better America.

We Live In A World Filled With Language. Language Imparts Identity, Meaning, And Perspective To Our Human Community. Writers Are Either Polluters Or Part Of The Clean-up Team. Just As The Language Of Power And Greed Has The Potential To Destroy Us, The Language Of Reason And Empathy Has The Power To Save Us. Writers Can Inspire A Kinder, Fairer, More Beautiful World, Or Invite Selfishness, Stereotyping, And Violence. Writers Can Unite People Or Divide Them.