If you were around in the '60s, you already know that music and art and love are a critical part of the revolution. This is how we fight.

We have not yet made violence against women abnormal, extraordinary, unacceptable. We have not yet come to see it as a pathological issue.

What we all have to know is the struggle is long. It's long. It may not end in our lifetimes. But the struggle is what gives our lives meaning and purpose. I tell people to take time out of activism every day to take care of their bodies, to take care of their souls and spirits.

Once you are diagnosed with cancer, time changes. It both speeds up insanely and stops altogether.

There is a beautiful expression in Nicaragua: "struggle is the highest form of song". I love that. We are in the struggle. It's like a river. Once you step into it you become the river. It's not, you go out and click on a couple of charities that you believe in, march in the Women's March, and you're done. Struggle becomes your life, transforming a paradigm that is based on domination into a paradigm of co-operation. Fighting for the liberation of women, of people of color, of indigenous people, of lgbtq communities. Fighting to protect immigrants and assuring the safety of refugees.

I don't get tired, because every time a woman doesn't die or doesn't get beaten or doesn't get raped or doesn't get honor-killed or doesn't get acid-burned, it's a huge victory.

I finally know the difference between pleasing and loving, obeying and respecting. It has taken me so many years to be okay with being different, and with being this alive, this intense.