Understanding The Power of Compassion – VEGAN VOICES writer Elin Gundersen

Next in our series on the writers of “VEGAN VOICES –  Essays by Inspiring Changemakers”, is Elin Gundersen.  

Elin is a creative concept developer, writer, and coach. Her passion is to spread awareness about the need for a simpler, more sustainable lifestyle. In 2016, she opened vegan café Greenseed with André Gundersen, and in 2017, they created a vegan festival, Green Food Fest. In 2020, along with Kristine Rykkelid and Erik Musum, they founded a development company for sustainable vegan concepts, Greenseed Norge AS. Building concepts, bridgework, and collaboration for improving the world, they enable and inspire people to go vegan. They invite co-creators to contribute to all their platforms, including vegan lifestyle blog ‘Make a Momentum’. They will make history when they open LOCO, Norway’s first full-range vegan grocery store chain. 

 

 

Extract from her essay in VEGAN VOICES:

“I was adopted at thirteen months old and brought up in a Seventh-Day Adventist household. As with veganism, I loved how religious texts spoke highly of love, compassion, and kindness. But in reality, I witnessed how interpretations of the words were also used to justify judgment, hate, and violence. This hypocrisy didn’t fare well with me; nevertheless, I myself was also guilty. Growing up, I just wanted everyone to get along, to be fine and happy. Some people seemed unfazed when witnessing cruelty, but I could feel the pain of every living organism through my bones, as if it were my own. Everywhere I turned, hearts were broken, wounds were opened, and I wondered why I was placed here, if only to suffer.”

 

Review of Vegan Voices by Bruce Friedrich, Co-founder & Executive Director, The Good Food Institute:

“There are as many reasons to be vegan as there are vegans, as this lovely anthology makes clear. So many of my heroes in one place—what a treat. Read it and be inspired.”

 

Vegan Voices: Essays by Inspiring Changemakers
Available at Lantern Publishing & Media
Paperback ISBN: 978-1-59056-650-3
eBook ISBN: 978-1-59056-651-0