On Nov. 15, Molly Barker, founder of Girls on the Run, spoke at the Mizzou Leadership Academy.  Her story, though repeated many times since she started Girls on the Run in 1996, is still as poignant as ever, striking a chord with so many young women today.  

Girls on the Run is a 10-12 week program for young girls during which they learn a curriculum dealing with who they are, how to get along with other people, and what the can do in their community, all while training for a 5K. Through the program, the girls grow in happiness, healthiness, and confidence.  

What started out with 13 young girls in Charlotte, NC, has now expanded to 200,000 girls in 210 cities.  By the end of the year, over one million girls will have gone through the program since 1996, all because of a 35-year-old woman who wanted to make a change.  

Barker was the tomboy in her neighborhood, the one who could run with the big kids. However, when she was 11, she transferred to a new school and found it hard to make friends. As her confidence broke down, she saw herself retreating into the “girl box” — the standards of society that all girls are supposed to conform too.  

As she grew older, the "girl box" continued to contain Barker, plunging her into alcoholism and depression. When she was 32, she desperately called her sister saying that she either needed to move to California or kill herself. Her sister’s simple words saved her life: “This too shall pass.” 

It was the next day, during the run in a rainstorm that Barker’s life changed. “In that period,” she recalled, “I became aware of you. I became aware of me... I realized for 32 years I was allowing myself to be defined by something that wasn’t me.”  

Barker’s life completely turned around. She recognized that her life was a blank slate, that she was essentially “nothing.”  She could be whatever she wanted to be.  

Angered at the years she had been trapped in her “girl box,” she decided to act, to keep other girls from experiencing the same fate.  Three years later, Barker returned to the school where she had transferred so many years ago with an idea to change the way all women thought about themselves.  

Barker’s work has changed the lives of young girls all over the nation. For 18 years, girls have been learning to break out their “girl box,” to celebrate life, and to celebrate themselves.  

As the organization has grown, Barker has grown as well.  Since her recent retirement from Girls on the Run, Barker has started several new projects, including the Naked Face Project, in which her and her friend, Caitlin Boyle, went 60 days without any feminine beauty products.  Through all of her work Barker has shared some important lessons.  

1. Always be yourself. 

2. The first step towards progress is a retreat to openness.

3. With nothing more than an idea and an internal fire, you can change the world.