Do you have other ways to support the crew? Please let us know in the comments \u2014 and thank you for all that you do!<\/p>\n

##<\/p>\n

Oops \u2014 make that 9. It\u2019s easy to Tweet about this.<\/h3>\n

[bctt tweet=”So many social justice avocates have had \u2018civilians\u2019 tell them, \u201cI could never do what you do.\u201d Many of us can\u2019t imagine doing anything else. ” username=”AndreaPatten”]<\/p>\n

[bctt tweet=”When we think about the part of #advocacy that\u2019s about speaking or writing in support or in favor of another, there are many more advocates in our lives than most of us initially realize.” username=”AndreaPatten”]<\/p>\n

[bctt tweet=”I am part of an ambitious new organization called Self-Care for Advocates and we are gearing up for our second Self-Care For Advocates Conference.” username=”AndreaPatten”]<\/p>\n

[bctt tweet=”Sponsorships help us to be able to offer the conference at a low cost to helping professionals, offer lots of scholarships, recruit top talent to speak at the conference, and helps us to continue to offer much needed services to #advocates as Self-Care For Advocates continues to grow! ” username=”AndreaPatten”]<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve been thinking a lot about advocacy. Avocate is both a noun and a verb. I remember very few profesional situations in which it wasn\u2019t a significant component of the work. Child protection. Addiction treatment. Domestic violence and sexual assault services. Community action and anti-poverty work. When I think about the timeframes of my work in those arenas, the need for advocates makes a lot of sense. We were needed to speak up for alcoholics and other addicts as sick people who needed treatment rather than bad people who needed punishment. Assess and mitigate risks to children, bringing services in an attempt to keep them safely at home with parents whenever possible. Supporting survivors of domestic violence in getting to safety \u2014 and helping them to hold responsible parties accountable.\u00a0 Lots of people who do this type of work have \u2018civilians\u2019 tell them, \u201cI could never do what you do.\u201d Many of us can\u2019t imagine doing anything else. Other kinds of advocacy might include canvassing for a candidate, sharing concerns on social media to bring greater awareness to something about which you care, networking and connecting people with complementary skills, needs, and interests, or ensuring that family members get proper medical care or most appropriate educational opportunities. In fact, when we think about the part of the advocacy definition that\u2019s about speaking or writing in support or in favor of another, there are many more advocates in our lives than most of us realize, right? We all need a a little extra boost once in a while. Advocating for Advocates! Although not currently employed as an advocate, I occasionally use this space to that end: writing in support of others. I believe today\u2019s post \u00a0falls \u00a0into the \u00a0networking and connecting part of the work. I am part of an ambitious new organization called Self-Care for Advocates and we are gearing up for our second Self-Care For Advocates Conference. Last year, this conference had approximately 600 from all over the nation in attendance and is only growing from there. This year’s conference is from May 12-14 and will again be hosted online and we are excited about our impressive speaker lineup: it includes a slew of people who are nationally and internationally recognized for their work with advocates and those they serve. We are confident that every participant will benefit \u2014 a lot! This year, we want to make sure the businesses that contribute so much to good self-care also have an opportunity to shine! In fact, sessions will be recorded and available on the Self-Care for Advocates website where sponsors will also be listed.\u00a0There are sponsorship opportunities for most levels, and any one of us would love the chance to talk about your involvement if you\u2019re interested. This sponsorship helps us to be able to offer the conference at a low cost to helping professionals, offer lots of scholarships, recruit top talent to speak at the conference, and helps us to continue to offer much needed services to advocates as Self-Care For Advocates continues to grow! Self-Care for Advocates Conference Opportunities Here\u2019s the link to sponsorship levels and registration. And if that doesn\u2019t work for you? You want to help but don\u2019t know \u00a0how? Here are seven more ways to advocate for advocates. Share the opportunity with other supportive business owners. Donate products to use as door prizes. Share this conference attendee registration form with advocates you know. (Also with social workers who need CEUs.) Contribute a scholarship. Like and follow us on Facebook and Instagram. Share our message with your fans, friends, and followers. Join the Self-Care for Advocates support group on Facebook. Encourage others to do the same. Participate. Do you have other ways to support the crew? Please let us know in the comments \u2014 and thank you for all that you do! ## Oops \u2014 make that 9. It\u2019s easy to Tweet about this. [bctt tweet=”So many social justice avocates have had \u2018civilians\u2019 tell them, \u201cI could never do what you do.\u201d Many of us can\u2019t imagine doing anything else. ” username=”AndreaPatten”] [bctt tweet=”When we think about the part of #advocacy that\u2019s about speaking or writing in support or in favor of another, there are many more advocates in our lives than most of us initially realize.” username=”AndreaPatten”] [bctt tweet=”I am part of an ambitious new organization called Self-Care for Advocates and we are gearing up for our second Self-Care For Advocates Conference.” username=”AndreaPatten”] [bctt tweet=”Sponsorships help us to be able to offer the conference at a low cost to helping professionals, offer lots of scholarships, recruit top talent to speak at the conference, and helps us to continue to offer much needed services to #advocates as Self-Care For Advocates continues to grow! ” username=”AndreaPatten”]  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14442,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,9],"tags":[],"post_folder":[],"class_list":["post-14665","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-special-topics","category-thinking"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14665","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14665"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14665\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14684,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14665\/revisions\/14684"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14665"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14665"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14665"},{"taxonomy":"post_folder","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreapatten.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post_folder?post=14665"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}