Be an Email Warrior

How?

There are 4 questions that educators use to structure a presentation… Why? What? How? What If? 

For the best learning outcome you need to answer them in that order. 

• Why? Is about what’s important anout this?  What’s in it for me? There are some MBTI personlity types that will tune out if they don’t have a sense of why this matters.
• What? Answers the question what is this about? What is the definition? What is the theory behind this? What are the principles? What are the facts? Answering this question brings it to life, makes it real, let’s us see exactly what we are talking about.
• How? This question can often be answered by instructions. This is how you do it. Here are examples. Here are 5 easy steps starting with a descroption of Step 1.
• What If? This question expands the topic. Imagine what will happen when this is done. What else could happen? It paints a picture of the future. It can galvanize people to action.

Answering HOW? by being an Email Warrior

When it comes to protesting, people are often stumped at HOW they can participate. They may get WHY it is important? Or they may just be getting to sense that this matters. They may be finding out WHAT the climate crisis is all about and the impacts of that. They may even have a couple of HOW’s in terms of what they can do – like recycling and making different choices around food and travel.

There are some bigger actions that involve influencing policy where people feel helpless.

The same can be said about Social Justice issues, we are all at different stages of awareness.

Regardless of the issue at hand, sending emails is one way to make your voice heard at the level of policy decisions. If you aren’t ready to show up in person to a protest or make phone calls or hand write letters or post-cards, sending an email makes an impact. Politicians take note of what people are emailing about. If one person sends an email about a topic, they realize there are many others with that opinion who have not bothered. They know people are watching.

Do what you can, what you are ready for, then do the next thing and the next. That’s my mantra for myself. I’ll share it if you’d like to use it too.