7 women and the secret to their greatness

That’s where the following stories come in. In some ways the best path toward improving one’s character is simply by spending time with people of good character, or even just by reading the stories of their lives. If I’ve made this sound in any way daunting, let me offer a happy bouquet of wonderful news. So you may have a sword and a desire to use it and lots of passionĪnd energy, but you’ve got to attend to the character-or the mettle- of that sword, lest it disappoint you in the heat of the battle, when it counts most. My friend Os Guinness wrote a book with the title Character Counts (which I recommend), and some have even gone so far as to say that character is everything. And it is, because if the steel of our sword has not been tempered to a certain strength, it may shatter when it’s put to the test, and it will be put to the test if you want to defend innocents and slay dragons, whether metaphorically or otherwise. So if we think it’s merely skill or talent or brilliance or ambition that will let us do what we want to do, we will eventually find that we were mistaken. That’s because character is inescapably at the heart of the life we all lead. Without a character of some real goodness and nobility, you simply won’t able to accomplish much of anything. You’ve got to forge a good-even noble-character. Which is why I want to draw your attention to something you may not have heard about, namely this: in order for you to do the glorious and important things you were born to do, you’ve got to do something else first. I’m here at the front of this book to make sure that you really do get to follow your dreams and do all those other things that you’ve heard about in other speeches (or in that fabulous Rodgers and Hammerstein song from The Sound of Music). I’m neither here to harsh your mellow nor to be the skunk at your garden party.

The note is not meant to be sour, but sonorous and not withering, but rousing. I don’t disagree with these sentiments, but I’ve appeared here at the front of this book to sound a rather different note. I am also assuming that if you are a recent graduate you’ve likely heard a speech or two about following your dreams-or about climbing every mountain, fording every stream, and following every rainbow.

I am assuming so, since I called you “graduate” in my salutation, just a few syllables back. Dear Graduate! So it seems you’ve graduated.

7 women and the secret to their greatness