Empowering women: ‘The List’
There is a strange condition that pervades social media circles. It’s called ‘The List.’ This list is much like other lists in our lives except that its purpose is to highlight the most powerful, most influential, most knowledgeable and most successful. The List represents the peak of achievement and it is important. It can lead to business opportunities, financial reward and self growth. Yet, The List has not changed much since I took my first steps on the social medial path five years ago. The List, like a lot of social media hype, may be becoming stagnant.
Mind you, the people who make The List rarely choose to be on it and more often than not, they have worked hard to earn the recognition being afforded to them. But recently, every time The List shows up on one of the various platforms with which I engage, I start to hear the dim of noise; in fact, I posit that The List is falling on deaf ears and blind eyes.
And so, I have to pose the question: when does The List start to do a disservice to those it honors and to those to whom it is directed? And what is its actual purpose?
A friend pointed out to me that at least this week’s iteration of The List focuses on women and that we truly have enough of that focus, even in social media which is, for all intents and purpose, another arm of marketing and communications. And while I agree to a certain degree, it is the same list of great women that has been published time and again. Moreover, The List is devoid of a balance of amazing women of color, young up and comers and women from all corners of the earth who may be doing wonderful, important, attention-warranting things but much more quietly and with far less accolades.
Are these lists that continue to pervade our lives a good thing?
In so far as shopping and reminders and buckets, I would say unequivocally, yes. Reminders are important for those of us in particular whose hormones tend to cause a condition called ‘menobrain.’ However, the other lists, the top 10s, most important, most influential, powerful gurus, rockstars, visionaries and like are akin to being chosen first for a game of kickball in grade school. While most people watch and wait on the sidelines, anxiously biting their nails in case they are the last to be added to a team, the same people are revered and awed time and again.
I strongly believe that women need more recognition professionally. I know some of the List women personally and I am grateful and happy to call some my friend. Others, I have crossed paths with at various business functions and I am proud of their achievements. However, I have also witnessed firsthand what exclusion does to a person’s drive and feelings of self worth. I have heard women of color discuss how the tech world treats them, and their regular exclusion as speakers at conferences. And I have met young women who believe that they’ll never ever achieve what X person on The List has achieved. And to each and every one of these women, I want to share that The List is irrelevant, not the women on The List but The List itself. It doesn’t matter; no one is paying attention anymore.
To those of you who feel an inclination to recreate the wheel over and over again, I challenge you to look outside the box and truly engage with others who are doing great things on a smaller scale. To the women who worship The List, I challenge you to start recognizing how wonderful and powerful you are without someone telling you that you are. And to women of color, I apologize because I find it appalling that we continue to discuss the challenges that you face without doing enough about it.
As women, we owe it to the next generation to find a way to communicate that making The List is not empowering; what is empowering is recognizing the sum of our achievements as women. Less noise, more signal.
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Pondering the weighty subject of… weight.
Guyside columnist Bob LeDrew will never be mistaken for this person.
I know I don’t. But I do see a certain uptick in that “time spent thinking about diet” graph in recent years.
As an adolescent, I was blessed with a metabolism that burned everything I could shovel into my mouth and then some. And even through most of my adult life, I really haven’t thought about diet beyond “when is the next meal?”
But as I edge toward 50, I have started to make some changes. Why? First, I have seen that little band of blubber around my waist grow from a finger-width to what is probably 15-20 pounds of weight I don’t really need. Second, my encounter with bladder cancer in 2006 led to some increased concern about health in general. Third, it was always so simple when you could go out for beer and wings at will and never show any effect (my personal best: 80 wings with an unwise quantity of beer to wash ‘em down in an evening), but when you start to feel the hangover from booze as well as post-gluttonous digestive effects, it makes you think.
At least when it comes to body image, I think men and women are working from two separate objectives. It’s my belief that generally, women are more affected by pop-culture images of women than men. I don’t look at Hugh Jackman and think “I’m grotesque.” I think men are more tied to the body image of their younger selves, and that it takes some sort of breakthrough for a man to realize that his body isn’t the same at 47 as it was at 17, or 27.
And of course, it’s clear that we men have some real issues around body image — and body reality. Even if you think you’re fine, men in the United States have a real-life obesity problem. Check this out.
These guys show the “average” man from each of the US, Japan, the Netherlands, and France
I certainly am aware of this reality. And I would like to make some changes. I don’t need or want to turn into the aforementioned Mr. Jackman. So here’s an entirely arbitrary list of what I think is going on with my diet — what I am doing right, and what I am doing wrong at this point?
Good points:
- I don’t eat a lot of fried food
- My vegetable intake is good
- I eat fish at least once a week
Now the weak points:
- Too many canned soups for lunch (bad for the sodium count)
- My long-term love affair with all things chocolate needs to be pruned
- Not enough snacking action using “healthier things” like fruit or things that aren’t chocolate
- I like beer
I’m going to start doing two things. I’m going to track how many healthy snacks I eat and how much chocolate I consume. And every week, I’m going to update this table as a way of being accountable to you — and to me.
| Healthy Snacks | Chocolate | |
| Week of October 13 | 0 | 2 bars, 1 gelato |
Wednesday Bubble: Giving Thanks
Ain’t no Wednesday Bubble this week.
Granted, I thought about sharing news of a study about spa and your health. Or discussing how many calories Americans are actually drinking. Or, providing you with healthy Thanksgiving meal tips. Instead, I felt it was more important to share that I am truly thankful that you take the time out of your schedules to read Flashfree. Truly thankful. And truly happy.
I had a book when I was growing up entitled “That Happy Feeling of Thank You.” I still have it. And sometimes I secretly linger in its battered pages and just pause for a moment.
“Thank you” is for not being afraid of darkness or being alone.”
“And, “thank you” is for growing up, too — For being brave enough to tell the truth — even when it would be easier not to.”
“Thank you” is to know a friend who will stretch out on the warm grass and pretend along with you that the whole world is upside down.”
What are you thankful for?
Seriously, take a moment and think about it.
Me? Although this has been one of the most challenging years in my entire career, with little time to breathe, I am eternally grateful for the work and income, for my friends who have put up with my crankies and my long absences, and for the few who’ve consistently held me up. You know who you are.
Thanksgiving really isn’t about eating; it’s about sharing and celebrating the gifts in our lives that really matter.
I am truly blessed.
Thank you.
Read MoreWednesday Bubble: Team Brilliant
Team Brilliant.
Just like Flashfree, it’s all about community.
If you are curious why I am posting a photo of myself, stripped down, unadulterated wearing a tee that reads ‘Heal Spot, Heal,” I would like to share a story.
Years ago, I met the amazing author Patti Digh on Twitter. And then I met her in real life a few times. And spoke with her on the phone and asked her to guest post on Flashfree. You can find those posts here.
Patti has a lovely family, two beautiful daughters, a dog and a husband she calls “Mr. Brilliant.” Mr. Brilliant’s alter ego is John Ptak. And John and I became virtual friends through our love of science and vintage ads. You can find John’s blog here.
Patti and John have built a community that is global and far-reaching. And so, when John was diagnosed this summer with kidney cancer, that community went into action and formed Team Brilliant, the goal of which was to give back all that John and Patti have given. You see, John had recently gave up his health insurance policy.
John’s surgery went well. And Team Brilliant has raised over $98,000 (just a wee bit short of their $100,000 goal) to pay for his medical care. I am proud to be a member of Team Brilliant. And so, I wear the tee shirt (which, by the way, was designed by Patti and John’s daughter Emma) to demonstrate my support.
The tee shirt.
It’s a symbol of community, the gift that we can give by supporting each other through the good times and the bad. But it’s more than that. Because it demonstrates the power that each of us has within to make a difference. And how that power grows exponentially every time someone else joins in.
I purchased two shirts — the one I am wearing in the picture — and the one that I am going to send to one of you (Size L) All I ask is that you write a comment below about community and donate whatever you can to Team Brilliant; even $1 can make a diference.
We’ve got two days to make it to goal and the Team is short less than $2K. Want to help them get over the hump? All it takes is a few prayers, a dollar or two and a comment (including your contact info). Who knows? Maybe that comment will make all the difference to someone else who needs a little bit of help, and send a message that love, light and healing are mighty powerful forces.
Pretty brilliant? Community sure can be!
Read MoreStone Soup
To Life: Friendships
L’Chaim. To life!
Several years ago, my mother shared a story about a dear friend’s mother dying the day before the friend’s daughter was getting married. In Judaism, those who pass are typically buried with 24 hours. This is dictated by the Torah. Kabbalah teachings also suggest that immediate burial brings closure to the soul in terms of its relationship to the physical body, thereby allowing it to pass over. In this particular situation, the rabbi told my mother’s friend to have the wedding first, and then the funeral.
Life before death.
Although my mother told me this story within another context, I relate it to connections and their growing importance in our lives as we age.
Data from a study published in Psychological Review in 2000 suggests that women’s inherent response to stress is to ‘tend and befriend’ rather than ‘fight or flight;’ in other words, there is a biologically-defined strategy or pattern that involves caring for offspring, joining social groups, and gravitating towards friends under stressful circumstances. This is driven, at least in part, by the release of the hormone oxytocin, which coupled with endogenous opioids and other sex hormones, promotes maternal behavior as an alternative to the male-oriented fight and flee response.
Findings from the Nurses Health Study have also shown that friendships help prevent the development of physical impairment and facilitate a more joyful existence. What’s more, having a strong social network can lower blood pressure and heart rate and improve cholesterol levels.
Our community is ever more important as we begin to lose family members to illness, our children begin their own journeys and our hormones start to wreak havoc on our bodies and our minds. Nature has provided us with a built-in prompt to maintain those ever important bonds. Our inherent tendency to nurture completes the picture.
It appears that as women, we possess the strongest alternative strategy to aging in existence. Our friends.
L’chaim.
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