ROCHESTER WOMEN’S COUNCIL ATHENA AWARDS Words of Wisdom

In response to Mayor Duffy’s challenge posed at the Rochester Downtown Development luncheon in December 2009 – “Why doesn’t anyone write a positive blog about Rochester?”…. here it is, Mayor.

Wisdom gleaned from the 22 Nominees for ROCHESTER WOMEN’S COUNCIL ATHENA AWARDS at the luncheon on January 21, 2010

• Don’t be married to a plan; be married to a goal.
• Let the people working for you work your “weaknesses”.  Everyone should work her strengths.
• If you don’t have a passion, you are not going to be happy.
• There are no obstacles to your dreams, only challenges.
• Believe in yourself.  Find that place in yourself that brings greatness.
• In these times, you cannot give up; connect, connect, connect.  Be out there making a difference.  Hang on.  Things will change.  We are not doomed to living in a recession for the rest of our careers.  Make each part-time and voluntary opportunity pay off.
• Be careful not to hurt your professional reputation on social networking sites.
• Mary-Frances Winters twenty years ago said at an Athena Awards luncheon, If not me, who and if not now, when?
• Our individual success is our collective success.  Pay it forward.  I help open doors for women because others open them for me.
• Gloria Steinem said re Ginger Rogers: she did everything that Fred Astaire did but backwards and on high heels.
• The TGIF Principle:  Tenacity, gratitude, integrity, and faith.
• The twenty-minute rule: do things for twenty minutes at a time; it gets you over the hump of getting started; after that it’s easy to keep going.
• The Goddess Athena (for whom this award was named) was known for her thoughtfulness and heroic endeavors.  One word of advice:  persevere.  Use the opportunity to increase your education and knowledge, to get on community boards, to work with existing clients, and to be out there working on your career.  Set goals and stick to them.  Increase your value to your current organization.
• If there was one thing that one speaker would change, it would be to make young women instantly 50 years old to give them the confidence of a 50-year-old woman.
• Successful endeavors come from passion.
• These are the days not to be a team of one.

Davies Paintings Collection

Spent two hours at the Everson Museum in Syracuse for the last day of the exhibit Turner to Cézanne – Masterpieces from the Davies Collection, National Museum Wales, which was 56 out of the 260 paintings collected by Gwendolyn and Margaret Davies, sisters born in the early 1880’s, from artists who were rejected before they were acclaimed:  Turner, Daumier, Pissaro, Monet, Manet, Moret, Moriset, Bevan, and Cézanne among others.

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan

To prepare for the May visit by Lisa See at Arts & Lectures (http://www.artsandlectures.org), started Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, a novel set in mid 19th century China.   Things I didn’t know: details of foot binding (OMG; had previously held the vague notion that bound feet were merely strapped together at the ankles!); hierarchy of Chinese families in mid nineteenth century, which provided insight into and appreciation of what I experienced during my trips to the Fan family compound near Shanghai China in 2008 and 2009 and to the countryside in Sichuan Province in 2005.

Lincoln’s Legend

Finished Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin.   Impressed by Lincoln’s listening intently to everyone but making his own decisions; his being devoid of personal ego.  It was interesting to compare the level of partisan gridlock in the country then to now.  Also saw the movie Invictus.   Impressed by Nelson Mandela’s having the same leadership style and world view as Lincoln did.

Lessons Learned from Rule Against Murder

Finished Louise Penny’s Rule Against Murder and heard her speak at Arts & Lectures (http://www.artsandlectures.org).  Her lessons learned:  don’t announce on CBC radio that you are retiring to write a book (that’s an instant recipe for writer’s block); to refuse trying to write because of fear of failure is worse than trying and failing; write for yourself, don’t write in anticipation of what you think your critics or readers will say.