The Confident Woman: Start Today Living Boldly and Without Fear (15 page)

Mom and Dad were watching TV when Mom said, “I’m tired, and it’s getting late. I think I’ll go to bed.” She went to the kitchen to make sandwiches for the next day’s lunches, rinsed out the dessert bowls, took meat out of the freezer for supper the following evening, checked the cereal box levels, filled the sugar container, put spoons and bowls on the table and started the coffee pot for brewing the next morning. She then put some wet clothes in the dryer, put a load of clothes into the wash, ironed a shirt and sewed on a loose button. She picked up the game pieces left on the table and put the telephone book back into the drawer.

She watered the plants, emptied a wastepaper basket and hung up a towel to dry. She yawned and stretched and headed for the bedroom. She stopped by the desk and wrote a note to the teacher, counted out some cash for the school outing, and pulled a textbook out from under the chair. She signed a birthday card for a friend, addressed and stamped the envelope and wrote a quick list for the supermarket. She put both near her purse.

Mom then creamed her face, put on moisturizer, brushed and flossed her teeth and trimmed her nails. Hubby called, “I thought you were going to bed.” “I’m on my way,” she said. She put some water into the dog’s bowl and put the cat outside, then made sure the doors were locked. She looked in on each of the children and turned out a bedside lamp, hung up a shirt, threw some dirty socks in the laundry basket, and had a brief conversation with the one child still up doing homework. In her own room, she set the alarm, laid out clothing for the next day, and straightened up the shoe rack. She added three things to her list of things to do for the next day.

About that time, the hubby turned off the TV and announced to no one in particular, “I’m going to bed.” And he did.
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Men have a lot of wonderful strengths and as we have already stated in this book they have abilities that we don’t have, but we are definitely not “the weaker sex.”

No one could possibly wish to underestimate the influence of women in keeping the home and raising children. Where history has not been “fair” is in failing to record the outstanding achievements of women in areas generally thought to be dominated by men: government, politics, business, religion and science. Men have received credit in these fields but fail to report on the women who have succeeded in them. They seem shocked that a woman could accomplish anything outside the home. This is all part of the record that needs to be set straight. Throughout history, women have accomplished great things.

Let’s take a look at ten women who proved everyone wrong. Some of these are well-known and some are not, but all made incredible contributions to the world around them.

Wrong gender, great ruler—that about sums up the life of Queen Elizabeth I of England. Her notorious father, King Henry the Eighth, one of the great scoundrels of history, married eight times to father a boy, and accidentally begat a great who was never part of his plans. Elizabeth came to power when her sister Queen Mary, known as “bloody Mary” for her persecution of Protestants, died in 1558. Elizabeth ruled what came to be known as the “Golden Age” of history until 1603.

Elizabeth maintained her rule by pretending to be interested in Catholic suitors so the King of Spain would not invade England. In 1588, King Philip II finally realized he was dealing with a Protestant and sent the great Spanish Armada to conquer England once and for all. Just before this great deliverance for England and as the Armada was approaching, Elizabeth said to her troops at Tillbury, “I know I have the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too; and think foul scorn that Parma or Spain, or any prince of Europe should dare to invade the borders of my realm.” At the end of her reign, she said to her people: “Though God hath raised me high, yet this I count the glory of my crown: that I have reigned with your love.”
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I love the fact that Queen Elizabeth did not look at her body that she said was frail and weak, but she looked at her heart. She followed her heart and ignored her deficits. God will always strengthen those who are willing to look their weaknesses in the face and say, “You cannot stop me.”

Born to a family active in politics but not always progressive when it came to women, Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) received an exclusive boarding school education before she married her distant cousin Franklin Roosevelt in 1905. Over the next few years, with little other than family background, she became the leading woman politician of her day. She had an executive talent that couldn’t be denied. With Franklin, she had five children and immediately became active in politics when Roosevelt was elected to the New York Assembly. She worked for the New York State League of Women Voters and the Women’s Trade Union League to pass minimum wage laws. When her husband was struck with polio in 1921, she organized Democratic women to help Franklin be elected governor in 1928 and then as president six years later. After her husband’s death in 1945, President Truman appointed her as a delegate to the United Nations where she largely shaped the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Eleanor Roosevelt said: “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I lived through this horror, I can take the next thing that comes along . . .’ You must do the thing you think you cannot do.’” She learned that “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”
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You are able to say to yourself, “I lived through this horror, I can take the next thing that comes along . . .” You must do the thing you think you cannot do.

Eleanor Roosevelt definitely knew that she had to take action even though she felt fear. We need to “know fear,” not look for “no fear.” So many times we want to dismiss fear and keep it away, but fear cannot stop faith and determination. When fear comes knocking on your door, let faith answer and perhaps someday you will be in the history books.

Elizabeth Fry (1780–1845) was a Quaker minister and European prison reformer. The mother of ten children, Mrs. Fry was invited to do social work in England’s Newgate prison. Unaware of prison conditions, she said she found “half naked women, struggling together . . . with the most boisterous violence . . . I felt as if I were going into a den of wild beasts.” Mrs. Fry did nothing sophisticated to initiate reform but began reading her Bible to prisoners: “There they sat in respectful silence, every eye fixed upon . . . the gentle lady . . . never till then, and never since then, have I heard anyone read as Elizabeth read.”

From such simple beginnings, Fry went on to such innovations as suggesting that men and women be segregated in prison, that more violent offenders be kept from the less violent, and that prisoners be employed in some useful work. Her influence ranged throughout France and the British Colonies.
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I admire the fact that although Elizabeth Fry did nothing sophisticated to help bring prison reform, she did do what she could do. She read the Bible to the prisoners. Most of the world never does anything about the atrocities that confront society because they feel that what they could do would be so insignificant that it would not matter anyway. Elizabeth disproves that theory. If you will do what you can do, God will do what you cannot do. Doors will open, a way will be made, and creative ideas will come. You will also inspire others to do what they can do and even though each person can only do a little, together we can make a big difference.

Mary McLeod Bethune (1875–1955) was one of the most remarkable black women of her time. A graduate of Moody Bible Institute, she opened a school for black girls in Daytona Beach, Florida. It later became co-educational, and Bethune became increasingly involved in government work. From 1935–1944 she was a special advisor on minority affairs to President Franklin Roosevelt. She was the first black woman to head a federal agency and worked to see that blacks were integrated into the military. She also served as a consultant on interracial affairs at the charter conference of the United Nations. Bethune founded the National Council of Negro Women and was director of Negro Affairs for the National Youth Administration. The fifteenth of seventeen children born to slave parents, she came to have unrestricted access to the White House during Roosevelt’s life.
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Please note that Mary Bethune was the first woman to head a federal agency. I admire those who are the first to do anything simply because the one who goes first endures more opposition than those who follow later. They are pioneers, and they open the way and pay the price for future generations.

Margaret Thatcher (born 1925) became Britain’s first woman prime minister in 1979 and continued until 1990 when she voluntarily stepped down. She was the first prime minister to be elected three times to office in the twentieth century. Thatcher came up the political ladder with little encouragement. She was the daughter of a grocery owner and Methodist lay preacher and won distinction at Oxford earning degrees in chemistry and law. When she became active in Tory politics, she served as Secretary of State for Education and Science. She expressed her philosophy of leadership this way: “There can be no liberty unless there is economic liberty. . . . Extinguish free enterprise and you extinguish liberty.” She also said: “In politics, if you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done, ask a woman.”
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I get irritated with people who are proud of all their knowledge and degrees and yet never do anything remarkable. They especially irritate me when they judge those who are less educated but accomplish great things.

A confident woman may be a deep thinker, but she will also be an activist. She will take action when it is needed. Don’t be the kind of woman that thinks something to death. There is a time to think and a time to act, so make sure you know the difference. Margaret Thatcher had a brilliant mind and was highly educated, but she was also a doer.

Mary Fairfax Somerville (1780–1872) completed all of one year at a woman’s boarding school and is considered one of the greatest scientists of her day—but she had to learn her science the hard way. The only daughter of a Scottish admiral, she studied
Elements
by Euclid and an algebra text obtained from her brother’s tutor. From this unpromising beginning, she worked her way up to Newton’s
Principles
and went on to study botany, astronomy, higher mathematics and physics. Her textbook
Mechanism
became a standard in astronomy and higher mathematics for most of the nineteenth century, and
Physical Geography
caused her to be recognized throughout Europe. She became an honorary member of the Royal Astronomical Society.
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Mary proved that there is always a way for the determined woman. She did not give up in the face of difficulties and what seemed to be insurmountable disadvantages. Don’t give up your dreams either. Keep pressing forward!

Theodora, Empress of Byzantium (502–548) married Justinian, who ruled from 527–565, but it was his wife, a former actress, who saw to it that important legislation was passed and demonstrated the initiative to save her husband’s rule by resisting a revolt in 532. Justinian was ready to flee when Theodora persuaded him to defend the capital. In the end he won power for thirty more years, during which time Theodora’s name appeared in almost all important laws, including prohibitions against white slavery and the altering of divorce laws to make them more humane to women. When it came to religion, she strongly supported expressions of the Christian faith upholding the divinity of Christ. After her death in 548, her husband passed practically no important legislation.
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I wonder just how many men have gotten credit for the accomplishments of the great women standing behind them?

They say that behind every great man there is a great woman. I wonder just how many men have gotten credit for the accomplishments of the great women standing behind them? How many great inventors and creators were women forced to turn in their patents and ideas under their husbands’ names? History has not been fair to women. If it had been, we would see our history pages filled with accounts of great women who have done remarkable things.

Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811–1896) wrote what is probably the best-selling American novel of the nineteenth century, a truly Christian work by the title of
Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

A daughter of the famous preacher Lyman Beecher, she took an early interest in theology and works for social improvement. The large Beecher clan moved to Cincinnati where Lyman took over Lane Theological Seminary. There, Harriet Beecher came in contact with fugitive slaves and learned from friends and from personal visits what life was like for a black in the South. When her husband Calvin Stowe was named a professor at Bowdoin College in Maine, she was encouraged to write a book about the evils of slavery by a sister-in-law. The resulting classic sold over 300,000 copies in a year, a sales number absolutely unheard of at the time. The book was later turned into a play by G. L. Aiken and had a long run throughout the country, both before and after the war.
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At a time in our country’s history when politics and cultural change were still very much a man’s world, Harriet made her own mark as one of the most well-known writers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. She stood up to misguided and misinformed cultural and racial notions of the day and worked hard to ensure that people everywhere could experience freedom, regardless of their skin color. She was also credited with even bigger things. President Abraham Lincoln, when meeting her in 1862 during the Civil War, reportedly said “So you’re the little woman who wrote the book that started this great war!”