A great post today on one of my favorite blogs, A Cup of Jo. Good advice -- for career and life -- from smart women.
This nugget of wisdom from Anna Quindlen really resonates with me:
Don't ever confuse the two, your life and your work. That's what I have to say.
The second is only a part of the first...There are thousands of people out there with
the same degree you have; when you get a job, there will be thousands of people
doing what you want to do for a living. But you are the only person alive who has
sole custody of your life. Your particular life. Your entire life. Not just your life at a
desk, or your life on the bus, or in the car, or at the computer. Not just the life of
your mind, but the life of your heart. Not just your bank account, but your soul...
People don’t talk about the soul very much anymore. It’s so much easier to write a
résumé than to craft a spirit. But a résumé is cold comfort on a winter night, or when
you’re sad, or broke, or lonely, or when you’ve gotten back the chest X ray and it
doesn’t look so good, or when the doctor writes “prognosis, poor.”
And this one from Tina Fey:
Speak in statements instead of apologetic questions. No one wants to go to a doctor
who says, “I’m going to be your surgeon? I’m here to talk to you about your
procedure? I was first in my class at Johns Hopkins, so?” Make statements, with
your actions and your voice.
And finally this one, from Nora Ephron:
Whatever you choose, however many roads you travel, I hope that you choose not
to be a lady. I hope you will find some way to break the rules and make a little trouble
out there. And I also hope that you will choose to make some of that trouble on behalf
of women.
Girl with Black Eye by Norman Rockwell.
