Quotes

"Everything you see has its roots in the unseen world.
The forms may change, yet the essence remains the same.
Every wonderful sight will vanish; every sweet word will fade,
But do not be disheartened,
The source they come from is eternal, growing,
Branching out, giving new life and new joy.
Why do you weep?
The source is within you
And this whole world is springing up from it."

Sufi poet and mystic Jalal Al-Din Rumi

~~~~~~~~~

Singer Connie Francis and bipolar

Connie Francis reports that a biopic about her life is progressing. "The script is done and set to shoot later this year," she says. "I collaborated with Gloria Estefan, who’s going to portray me in the film." In the meantime, Francis, now age 69 - who has survived four divorces, bipolar disorder and a rape - maintains a busy schedule of concerts and says she always includes audience favorites, like her hit "Who’s Sorry Now."

More on the page Bipolar Disorder.

~~~~~~~~~~

The Talented Young People site

From Interview with Adam Sibley, creator of Talented Young People:

When I was young growing up there were so many things I dreamed of being or doing but there was no one stop place where I could find out everything I needed to know about achieving my dreams which were at the time becoming a Radio Presenter or a writer.

So I wanted to build a website where any aspiring talented young person could come and find out helpful tips and information to help them on their quest to fulfilling their dreams.

I grew up in the rural county of Cornwall in England which was miles away from the big cities like London where a lot of people go to fulfil their dreams so I wanted a website that would bridge the gap between the big cities and the little towns a website that would help remove barriers that were put in their way.

This is why we have the spotlight section on the website as I want to showcase people who have had barriers in their way to achieving their dreams the ones that can’t afford to go to twenty million auditions or those that have done hundreds of gigs but still not got the recognition they deserve.

I want to promote the best in young talent and help them get on the map.

Continued at Talented Young People.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Feminist Majority Foundation video: This is What a Feminist Looks Like!

[video]

Related perspective: Elizabeth Wurtzel on feminism
"Feminism, which was meant to be fun, has lately started to seem so sour... But it cannot be the case that we went through all that bra-burning and consciousness-raising to be left choosing between, yet again, the madonna or the whore.

"Balance is difficult. But we can do it; we’re women. Like Ginger Rogers, we’ve been doing everything that men do, only backward and in high heels, for a very long time."

More in her article Bitter ashes of burned brassieres.

Posted on Women and Talent
~~~~~~~~~~

Climbing Toward Our Dreams

In her article The Ascent of Your Dreams, Jenna Forrest writes about how daunting our dreams can seem, and how we can get sidetracked by others’ critical voices, and our own:

"Suppose in your life, you have your very own inner call, your personal Mount Everest to climb.

"At its pristine peak you might envision your own business, being a great parent, going to Tahiti for a winter, forgiving a spouse, or starting a church. Its nagging sensation is always calling you. You feel it with great passion.

"Because your inner voice gets drowned out by the chitter chatter of everyone around you, you can begin to believe what others tell you -- that you’re stuck, that you’ll never be able to forgive your spouse, or that you’ll never earn enough money running your own business."

But she also writes about the payoffs of having the courage to keep following your vision.

"You definitely get tired, but you keep going anyway, huffing and puffing your way uphill toward your own peak... With time, you become rewarded with a better view of a world you couldn’t see from down below.

On the switchbacks of the ascent of your dreams, you stop to look back on how far you’ve come. This is where you witness the peaceful expression of your faithful efforts. Your spirit is thanking you for wanting more -- for trying so hard and for not giving in so easily."

More in The Ascent of Your Dreams

Related:
When Family Dreams Clash, Find a Way for Everyone to Win, By Valerie Young
More articles by career counselor Valerie Young
My article: Negative self-talk
More Achievement / Vocation articles.

Posted on The Inner Entrepreneur
~~~~~~~~~

Ambition and Power - It’s Complicated

"She was a woman of charm, style and wit, and will and savagery."

That is a description of Anne Boleyn (second wife of Henry VIII) by Susan Brigden, author of New Worlds, Lost Worlds: The Rule of the Tudors, 1485-1603.

Natalie Portman portrays Anne in The Other Boleyn Girl [right], and says she saw the film as "a cautionary tale about capitalism. All of the characters who subscribe to these values of rising up and gaining power and who will step on anyone to get there are punished. Anne is certainly the most forward about it, but she is following her family’s values...

"I think it’s very different to be ambitious and to be ruthlessly ambitious, which Anne certainly is in the movie. In reality, an argument can be made that Anne Boleyn was witch-hunted because she had so much power."

Asked by Elle magazine about her own independence and ambition, she says, "It’s definitely complicated. I bury it a lot, which is a very common woman thing to do. They say women often preface their statements with ’This might sound stupid, but...’ It sort of tempers what you are going to say. It takes the edge off so you can still be seen as ladylike. I think I have a lot of that in me. I’m very nonconfrontational; I’m definitely a pleaser."

But she has also started her own production company, Handsomecharlie films (named after her late dog, Charlie). She says, "It is proactive. It gives you more control over creating things, as opposed to having to get hired every single time... Having your own company is a nice way to concentrate your ideas and make the kinds of movies you want to see."

From Natalie Portman interview by Ariel Levy, Elle, April 2008; more quotes in my article She Is Running The Show.

Being a "pleaser" may be one reason for many women having conflicted feelings about leadership and power.

As "Fried Green Tomatoes" co-producer Anne Marie Gillen once noted, "If you look at how little boys play on a team, there’s a leader, they pick you or they don’t pick you, they go out there and beat each other up, they win the game and it’s over and they put their arms around each other and go on. But little girls play one-on-one (and think), she’s my best friend - I don’t want to hurt her feelings, because if she leaves, I’m alone."

And psychotherapist Laura Morris, who works with a number of women in the entertainment industry, thinks "We are brought up to compete with other women. They are ’The Enemy’ - they’re going to get something we’re after. Men have a closer bonding... they aren’t that competitive with each other... I think we make our own glass ceiling by not being very nice to each other."

[Both quotes from my article Women in Film: Identity and Power.]

But do women have to "play like men" to gain leadership roles, corporate power or to realize other talents?

Judy B. Rosener, Ph.D., a management professor at the University of California, Irvine, thinks "we have defined everything in our society in terms of male behaviors, attitudes and values. Straight, white male. So if you’re anything but that, you are perceived as deficient, and have internalized that."

She also asserts, "From the day we’re born, we are told - in the United States, anyway - that only white males are smart, and the rest of us haven’t quite got it. It’s scary.

"I’m married to a white male, I’m the mother of one, and I’m the daughter of one. It isn’t white males against the rest of us, it’s that white males think it is unfair that they now have to compete with women and people of color.

"Until now, they only had to compete with other white men - and they understand them. They don’t understand the rest of us and that makes them anxious."

From my interview with Judy Rosener - she is author of America’s Competitive Secret: Women Managers - "This book proposes an audacious idea: that leveraging the talents of professional women will lead to more innovative, productive, and profitable organizations."

A related comment by Sharon Stone: "If I was just intelligent, I’d be OK. But I am fiercely intelligent, which most people find very threatening." [From my article Gifted Women: Identity and Expression.]

Perhaps many women of high intelligence and competence share her experience.

But some of the most compelling women in literature, films and on television are characters who use their sexual, intellectual and political power effectively - and with evident pleasure, though not without complications and conflicts.

Julianna Margulies plays defense attorney Elizabeth Canterbury on "Canterbury’s Law." In an early scene her character walks into a men’s bathroom to demand answers from another lawyer.

Margulies explains why she liked the scene: "Because it’s what’s important to her. To me, it’s nothing’s going to stop her from getting to the point. And if you’re in the men’s bathroom, I don’t care." [From interview on blog.meevee.com March 07, 2008]

She continues, "I personally, as Julianna, would have waited and waited, and then the moment goes by and then the person comes out and then you forget your whole point, you know?

"This is a woman who gets what she wants. She’s diligent; she’s unbelievably pushy and bossy. She doesn’t care if anyone is in there; she wants to go and get what she’s after."

Related:
article: Women of Talent - Power and Leadership
pages: Power; Leadership

Posted on Women and Talent
~~~~~~~~~

Eckhart Tolle on Self-esteem and Ego

Well, first there is the ego self-esteem. Which is really, even if you have high ego self-esteem.. there’s always hidden fear underneath it.

It’s always there to compensate for the fear you feel of not being good enough or perhaps failing. So you need to play a role of being big to compensate for fear of failure that’s deep down.

But that’s usually the world calls it.. the world would say he or she has high self-esteem. People who have big egos. But the world doesn’t realize that that’s not true self-esteem.

True self-esteem goes much deeper. It’s finding the source of power and aliveness deep inside. We talked about the lake. Realizing that within the depth of your being, there is that continuous source of intense aliveness and power, which is the stillness out of which everything comes.

From article Eckhart Tolle on Shyness, Self-esteem and Ego.

Image: "Reflecting Stream, Redding Connecticut" by Paul Caponigro - a smaller version is on the page Depth psychology 2 with quotes from the article On the Borderland by Jungian analyst Jerome Bernstein, including: "The Borderland is what I call that psychic space where the overspecialized and overly rational Western ego is in the process of reconnecting with its split-off roots in Nature."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~