Unless we self-reflect and make a change we risk becoming the voice we grew up defying. We might live long enough to see ourselves become the villain. The circle of defiance continues except now our children are the rebels and we are the evil empire.

I was in Grade five when I fell in love with basketball. Michael Jordan fuelled my over-the-top obsession with the sport. Being a kid with a disability didn't stop me from dreaming of dunking or playing one on one with Michael Jordan. Defying people's expectations has been one of my missions in life.

Glamour once ran an article called "30 Things Every Woman Should Have and Know by the Time She's 30." Neither section really captures the unbelievable amount of work women in their twenties do as they transform themselves from teenagers to adults. It's a lot. It takes more than a trip to Home Depot or Victoria's Secret.

Teen girls were mortified when photos of themselves in bra and panties or topless were sent all around the classroom. They just were doing what they'd been taught to do by TV, YouTube, magazines, their friends: "be cute," which has become code for "be sexy," which means show your stuff. And then they'd been shamed for it.

Marc and Craig Kielburger are the co-founders of Free The Children and Me to We, a social enterprise. They are authors of "The World Needs Your Kid: R...

I kind of thought that giving birth would automatically turn me into a bouncing, bib-juggling, broccoli-mushing machine who felt self-fulfilled because of motherhood. But it didn't. Having a baby was equivallent to a mini nuclear bomb going off in my mentality.