Expand with the Challenges and Enjoy the Adventure: HerStory Award
The first National HerStory of the year featured three women who inspired the audience with their stories of the joys, challenges, and adventures of service work.
Ms. Adia Lancaster, Director of the New Hope International Foundation and Women’s Federation for World Peace (WFWP) Global Women’s Peace Network Field Coordinator, gracefully inaugurated the virtual stage for the event.
WFWP USA President Kaeleigh Moffitt eloquently emphasized “The women that we meet through these kinds of awards, are not women who are seeking recognition. They do this out of their own volition, calling and their hearts and they want to make a difference in their communities, in their wider society and their homes and I think that is the true touch of women.”
Each of the awardees was introduced with their bios as well as a personal sharing from the WFWP member who nominated them. President Moffitt then virtually presented the award and each awardee shared her story with the participants.
The first awardee, Lou Anne McKeefery Lead, Emergency prep & reconciliation group, Almeida County Committee of Restoration, explained that opportunity and complacency are mutually exclusive from one another and they cannot co-exist when you are forging a new path. While opportunity brings challenges, difficulties, self-doubt, stress and fear it arises during unusual circumstances. On the other hand, complacency does not challenge you nor will it be an expanse of experience. In addressing challenges talked from personal experience concluding that “ when opportunity knocks as they say, embrace yourself and expand with it, step up to the challenges presented to you…Faith is the telescope that offers you a direction on which to focus. ” Her closing remarks drew inspiration from her grandfather's involvement in the United Nations during the 1940s. Quoting from his 1947 speech preamble for the UN Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization, "Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the fences of peace must be constructed.”
The second awardee, Vicki Latham PA-C, Founder, ToxinClear Health Network, started with saying, “Fear needs to become your friend in all your adventures because it is going to become your constant companion in all your adventures. If you are going to have adventures, it is going to be scary and you just have to accept to jump in there and do it anyway.” One of biggest challenges was as a midwife and single mother of four, facing financial struggles while delivering 12 babies monthly, she decided to change her situation. She became a physician assistant, successfully executing her five-year plan of getting her degree, paying off her student debt and being financially stable. Her motivation to explore toxins arose from a 2005 experience where she felt she was losing her memory. She started using some detox which got the toxins out and she felt her memory come back. She explained her three steps of success, “I do not do unforgiveness. I am quick to ask for forgiveness when I do something wrong and I don’t carry around the weight of unforgiveness… Second, I don’t ever give up. When you develop a goal or dream that you want, you never ever give up. As you go down the road, always pray for the red flags if you are on the wrong road so that you can go back and go the other way…The third one, that my body, mind and spirit has been created by God for a purpose and everything that I am is a gift from God and I see life as this grand adventure and find fun out of everything that I do. She happily concluded,” Live your purpose, do the best you can and have some fun. “
The third recipient of the award was Jane Califf, the Coordinator of the Bloomfield Citizens Solar Campaign. Her dedication to peace activism traces back to her teenage years when she joined her mother in attending Ban the Bomb rallies aimed at halting the testing and development of nuclear weapons. Throughout her activism journey, she courageously risked arrest by engaging in non-violent civil disobedience, driven by the belief that such actions could effectively garner media attention and contribute to advancing the cause. She concluded by expressing, “I have found joy in uniting with other like minded people to make a just world possible.”
In addition to congratulating all the January HerStory Awardees, we extend our deepest appreciation for their courage, resilience, and inspiring stories. Each awardee has contributed valuable insights that resonate with the audience. Here's to a year filled with growth, empowerment, and the pursuit of our dreams.