Women's History Month: Unspoken Heroines

One of my passions is reading women’s diaries and journals, particularly those of the westward movement.  My personal library includes upwards of over fifty of these journals.   In reflecting on women’s history and contributions the following quote from the book “More than Petticoats……Remarkable Montana Women” by Gayle Shirley  is applicable to begin Women’s History Month:

“There are unwritten chapters in the history of every new settlement, which no pen will ever write, but could they be written, they would tell of the many heroines as well as heroes, women as brave and deserving of credit as those who landed from the Mayflower.  They have had much to do in the ‘winning of the west,’ and a higher civilization has always followed closely in the footsteps of the woman pioneer.”

                                    ……Lucia Darling Park, 1839-1905, Pioneering Teacher, Montana.

Gayle Shirley has a series of More Than Petticoats books detailing women’s remarkable lives from various states.  See http://www.gayleshirley.com/

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Dream Big.......

When you eat an elephant, eat it one bite at a time!  This may seem like an unusual expression for beginning a blog post, but it’s one that I’ve used many times in my teaching, consulting and coaching capacities. Fundamentally the message is “don’t bite off more than you can chew.”  Usually the phrase serves a useful set point with my clients when they are tempted to be over zealous and try to accomplish too much at one time.

Often I find people struggling to achieve their vision, be it a personal or business vision.  Generally it’s not that the vision is unrealistic or unobtainable.  Rather, people are thwarted by attempting to do too much at one time.  This inevitably results in frustration, loss of confidence, feelings of failure and inability to reach a rewarding goal. 

A vision may not be achieved in a day, a week or even, perhaps, in several years.  What we must realize is that incremental steps are necessary to attain transformational change; the journey to the vision can be as satisfying as accomplishing the vision itself.  Achieving each step presents new insights, builds confidence, gives a sense of accomplishment, energizes and motivates us and lays the foundation for the next step to continue the quest.

Dream big!  But make it a practice to savor the dream one step at a time.

View "Dream Big:  A Monarch Minute" Inspriational Thoughts for Women Leaders at: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlxaH1ohg7k&context=C38fb414ADOEgsToPDskI__oGpTuSe5-IwddJHZq_T

Check out how to develop SMART goals.  These will help you develop discrete, manageable steps to achieve your dream.  See http://topachievement.com/smart.html