Where has change ever been clean and nice? It has always been messy and painful.

I learned that victims come in all image - some raped, some witnessing an act of violence, some losing loved ones. I learned that the solutions come by both listening to the people impacted by the crisis and by learning from historical experiences in other places.

Sometimes you just have to jump off the cliff without knowing where you will land.

Everything is give and take. The solutions are in the middle not in the extremity of the situation.

I firmly believe today that the only way to stop violence against women is to speak out and refused to be silenced.

I don't have a child, so Women for Women is like my child. But I always said I would step down after 20 years. I didn't want to be a 60-year-old woman holding on to something I created when I was 23.

As women, we must speak out, speak up, say no to our inheritance of loss and yes to a future of women-led dialogue about women's rights and value.