Join me tonight for Books on Books on Books, live on Zoom, as we explore the introduction to Clarissa Pinkola Estés’s Women Who Run with the Wolves.

We’ll begin a conversation about instinct, intuition, and the wild woman—and what it means to reclaim a relationship with our own knowing. Tonight is also a taste of my upcoming Women Who Run with the Wolves group, where we’ll journey more deeply into the book together.

Come curious, whether you’re opening the book for the first time or returning to an old companion.

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A scarf reading “Save Women’s Sports” became the catalyst for a national conversation. Our action at the Portland Thorns game used political theater to make the struggle over women’s sports visible—and the response carried our message far beyond the stadium. Viewed through Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, it illustrates how timing, terrain, and an opponent’s reaction can amplify a small group’s influence. In the warfare of ideas, political theater can turn a message people ignore into a contradiction they cannot unsee.

This post was inspired by apt commentary and analysis of my Save Women's Sports Portland Thorns Action by Ed Drain on Facebook who wrote:

You boys got Sun-Tzu'd by Amy E. Sousa and her many friends. People are comparing her to Bruce Lee when he talked about Attack by Draw. It is quite apt, but the deeper and truest analysis puts her moves much closer to Sun Tzu.

Sousa’s Playbook Through The Art of War:

1. “All warfare is based on deception.”
The group hid its XX-XY shirts during the first half and revealed them, with the banner, only when the second half began. Security and other fans couldn’t anticipate or head off the demonstration because they didn’t know it was coming.

2. “If your opponent is of choleric temper, seek to irritate him.”
This is the core of the comparison. Sousa picked a fan base known for strong progressive and pro-trans sentiment. Any heated reaction there would be more newsworthy than the banner itself. The demonstration needed the reaction to work, and the setting made a reaction likely.

3. “The good fighter... puts himself beyond the possibility of defeat, and then waits for an opportunity of defeating the enemy.”
The action was built so that every outcome favored her side. If the banner stayed up, the message was shown at a women’s match. If the group was ejected, that was a free-speech story. If fans got physical, that was a victimization story with video. There was no result that counted as a loss.

4. “Know the enemy and know yourself; in a hundred battles you will never be in peril.”
The September ejection at the same stadium worked as a reconnaissance run. It showed how Thorns security and fans would respond. October’s plan was adjusted to match: a larger group, the reveal timed for continuous play, and a reporter present.

5. Timing and terrain.
Sun Tzu stresses choosing the moment. The demonstration came about a week into voting on I-638, the measure Sousa and Kruse are pushing in Washington. National coverage at that moment was worth far more than it would have been in, say, February.

6. Using allies and “spies.”
Sun Tzu devotes a full chapter to intelligence and information. An OutKick reporter was on site filming, so the group’s version of events reached a national audience within hours. A DOJ review followed by morning. That multiplied the effect of a 20-person action.

7. Winning without a pitched battle.
“Supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting.” Sousa didn’t need to persuade anyone in the stadium. The aim was the audience watching afterward, especially Washington voters.

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On October 13, over 12 girls from the Camas cross country team walked off the field in protest of being forced to run against a boy.

The night before, five seniors quit the team, including three team captains. Other girls showed up for the race out of uniform and refused to step up to the starting line. These girls showed immense courage, integrity, and solidarity.

While I’m so proud of these girls, they should never have been put in a position to become student activists to protect girls’ sports. Adults should have intervened before this ever became an issue.

Parents tell me these girls wanted their message seen and their voices heard, but they don’t want to keep doing this. I want these girls to know we’ve heard their voices, received their message, and now adults are taking responsibility for what happens next.

On Wednesday, Oct. 21, we will be returning to Camas to hold a rally of support and solidarity for our girls.

Courage calls to courage, and the community has heard the call of Camas Courage from these brave girls.

As the years have gone by, the issue of boys in girls’ sports has become more and more contentious. There is something WA State adults can do to stop this right now and protect girls’ sports now and forever: vote YES on 638 Fairness in Girls Sports to ensure that girls’ sports remain single-sex.

Right now, the rules say any boy can compete in girls' sports simply by declaring a new identity. The rules are unjust and harmful to our daughters. Adults need to know they don't need a permission slip for courage. Now is the time to stand up!

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Men like Coach Matt LeGrand, Principal Travis Drake, or Superintendent John Anzalone are all cowards hiding behind rule books. Girls should not have to absorb the risks while adults in authority decline the professional discomfort of speaking up.

“Just following the law” is not a defense of your conduct. Women in the past have been excluded from voting, higher education, financial independence, making their own medical decisions, and participating in sports under laws that so called respectable authorities enforced. Those barriers only changed because good men stood up and challenged them.

These coaches, principals, and superintendents could make a personal stand outside of their profession to protect girls by urging WA voters to vote YES on 638 Fairness in Girls’ Sports. They could just make a stand saying they personally think this is wrong.

These grown men need to know they don’t need a permission slip for courage! Leadership requires more than pointing to the rulebook while children bear the consequences.

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Just as I have been talking with a young trans identified male, I hope to be able to have more of these conversations with Ravyn or other young females who are willing to earnestly engage.

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I reference this book more than any other book—and this month, we’re gathering to discuss why.

The Gift of Fear opens a vital conversation about intuition, instincts, boundaries, and the signals we’re so often taught to dismiss. How do we recognize danger? What makes us second-guess what we know? And how do we find the courage to act before politeness or pressure overrides our instincts?

Join me for a conversation about trusting your perceptions, recognizing manipulation, and reclaiming your right to say no.

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TRANSCRIPT (Unedited):

Whether a group of males is more at risk from other males or whether a group of males is less of a risk to females is irrelevant when it comes to single-sex safeguarding provisions for females. So let’s look at gay men or disabled men.

So gay men and disabled men are the most at risk for sex-based violence from other men. Gay men and disabled men Present the least amount of risk to women and girls. But regardless of these two things, gay men and disabled men still need to use male facilities. The fact of their vulnerability among other men should be addressed.

That should absolutely be addressed and men should work as a collective to make sure that those men remain safe. That they themselves control their impulses and do not perpetrate violence on these men. But the fact of their vulnerability level and the fact that they are less likely

to harm women does not mean they should be put into female spaces. And my point here is that females are not human shields for men who are at risk from other men. And our judgment about these men is not based on their group.

I’m not judging gay men as a group when I say they don’t belong in women’s spaces. I’m not judging disabled men as a group when I say they don’t belong in female spaces. I am simply holding a boundary around female spaces. Whatever group membership they are a part of, So,

when you are telling me that there is 1% of men who are more safe than other men, Or there is 1% of men who are more at risk to male-on-male violence than other men. That is irrelevant to me when I am holding a boundary for women and girls.

And the fact of the matter is that these men are the very men who are violating women and girls’ boundaries the most. And I am calling them out. Based on their behavior of violating that boundary, and when I name them as their group membership,

I’m simply observing that these are the men most likely to violate the privacy and the integrity of women and girls’ single sex safeguarding provisions, sports, prisons, domestic violence shelters, all of these things. By using their identity as a means to get in. But my work is about boundaries. Holding this boundary for women and girls.

And I see this boundary very clearly. And I see sex very clearly. You do not belong in based on the fact of your sex. Not based on the fact of your group membership. It is based on the fact of your sex. I place you with all of the other males who do not belong in.

So I hope this will help.

1. This mom introduced a self-judging question to her son about his body. She gives him a leading question that introduces shame, “How do you feel about having a penis?” This question is already dissociative, it implies that his penis is something other than himself- it is something he “has” rather than something that IS part of him. He follows her lead when he says he feels negative, “grumpy.” And she affirms this negative judgment by repeating it, “grumpy.”

2. This mother introduced dissociation and self-objectification. Rather than staying with the sensation and asking her son about how his body feels, she asks him what he thinks about his body from an objectified position. This removes him from an embodied position of feeling his bodily sensations and asks him a question about what he thinks about his body. If she asked him this about his nose while implying he needs a nose job, the current culture might be able to better see the judgment and objectification inherent in the question.

3. This mother ultimately introduced a shaming question to her son. Kids pick up on the judgements of their parents. Kids who feel shame about their bodies are less likely to be able to speak from embodied authority about their boundaries. Kids who are ashamed of their bodies are more vulnerable to predators and less likely to report abuse when it happens.