BlogHer Bits: Women's Wisdom

During today’s BlogHer sessions I attended one facilitated by two entrepreneurs: Susan Mernit and Patricia Handscheigel. They’re both savvy and a touch sassy - and I mean that in a good way. Susan has been developing a software product that will be beta-tested soon. Patricia founded stylediary.net and sold it late last year to stylehive.com. They were well-suited to lead a discussion about the lives and thoughts of women entrepreneurs.

Whether you're a full-time entrepreneur, serial entrepreneur, or simply watching from the sidelines, you can benefit from the nuggets of wisdom these women have gleaned from both triumphs and setbacks. I wrote their observations down as quickly as my pen would write. Hearing what they’ve learned in their life stories was like discovering the keys to the queendom. Except everyone gets the keys, and everyone gets to be the queen. If not of her world, at least of her own life.

Inner challenges are the hardest to overcome. You shouldn’t ask, “Who am I to do this?” but rather, “Who am I not to do this?”

A great entrepreneur is someone who can live in chaos and uncertainty. Entrepreneurs say, “I think there’s a better way.”

Follow your passion.

Sometimes what holds us back is not the glass ceiling but the sticky floor.

Don’t let anyone discredit your value.

Success is about persistence. Keep fighting your way through.

Figure out how to keep going no matter what.

Your recovery strategy is what’s important; avoiding mistakes is not.

Know that you need help. Ask for mentors.

Combine believing in what you’re doing with riding through the absolute fear.

You must have three things: 1. Passion about your interests. 2. Truth – be real, be honest about what’s going on. 3. Belief in yourself. The ones who fail stop believing in themselves. (Note: these words of wisdom came from a male participant in the group whose name, I believe, was Mikhail.)

I keep moving.

Play to your strengths. I’m not good at everything and I don’t have time to learn everything. Find someone at a price you can afford who can help free you to focus on what you have a track record of being successful at.

Stand tall within yourself. Define what success means and stay true to your entrepreneurial vision.

Entrepreneurship is like a soccer game – sometimes you’re running, sometimes you’re kicking, sometimes you’re sitting on the bench.

Failure is in the eye of the beholder. You’re in charge of how you’re going to view what’s happened.

Balance is great but balance doesn’t make you great.

You Know You Have a Bad Cold When....

....you make a phone call and the person who answers says, "Just a minute, sir, I'll be right with you," and you're NOT a sir.

....it's 85 to 90 degrees outside, the sun is shining, and you're shivering like a Chihuahua.

....your ears are so stopped up you can't even hear yourself think.

....but you can hear yourself breathe.

....you'd like to wake up and smell the coffee but you can't. Smell the coffee, that is. Not even Starbucks bold flavor of the day.

....you wonder if anyone would mind if you just wore your pajamas to work.

Disco Fever

Over the holiday weekend I was rifling through a stack of magazines when I came across an advertisement that caught my eye primarily because it was the only one not promoting yet another new medication that I should talk to my doctor about.

The ad was for car insurance. The target audience was presumably anyone who can remember the 70s from actually having been there, not from watching tv reruns on Nick at Nite. The headline read ‘Disco Fever.’ Answering yes to three or more of the disco-related questions implied that you are still stuck in the 70s. It was a lighthearted attempt to connect with baby boomers by reminding us of the artifacts of our youth such as platform shoes, 8-track tapes, and John Travolta’s dance moves.

I chuckled at the memories and then noticed another part of the ad. It was a list of hit disco songs, including “Let’s Get It On,” by Marvin Gaye; “Love to Love You Baby” by Donna Summer; and “Stayin’ Alive” by the Bee Gees. As I scanned the list I realized that I have loaded every single one of those songs onto my iPod and listen to them semi-regularly.

It was a sobering moment of truth, like understanding that the reason people have been smiling at you for the last hour is not because of your dazzling brilliance, but because you have a large piece of spinach dangling from your front teeth. The advertising people were laughing at, not with, me.

I can’t deny it: I have Disco Fever. I loved disco music during its heyday and still do. Certainly my musical horizons have broadened over the years. But science fiction writers couldn’t invent a better machine to take me back in time than songs from the era when I was carefree and cool (or thought I was). Just a few measures of that booming electronic drum kit mixed with a syncopated bass beat and in an instant I'm 18 years old, dancing in my own Dance Dance Revolution. And I know I'm not alone in feeling this way.

Yet many of my disco-loving contemporaries hesitate to admit that their feet twitch just a little when they hear “I Will Survive” by Gloria Gaynor or “I'm Your Boogie Man” by KC and the Sunshine Band. Perhaps they fear being ridiculed if their peers find out, the way many Republicans are feeling these days.

Of course I can’t blame people for being cautious about admitting to a penchant for a musical genre that spawned some curious products, such as Qiana knit shirts and exotic mixed drinks made with beer. Let me explain.

Here in the Midwest during the late 70s many of us enjoyed a hotspot called Pogo's. Pogo's was the hip, happening place for young college students who weren't old enough to go to real nightclubs. A personable, poodle-haired deejay named Greg Gann spun tunes from a booth that looked out over a dance floor made of colored lights timed to light up with the beat of the music.

Even more memorable, however, were the special drinks and the commemorative Pogo's glass they were served in. Beer, orange juice, and grenadine topped with a cherry was the most popular combo. These imaginative concoctions were due to Kansas liquor laws at that time. Nightclubs for the 18 – 20 year-old set could serve lower alcohol content beer (called “three-two” beer) but not wine or spirits. You couldn't drink an actual Tequila Sunrise but you could sip on the beer imitation and pretend it was the real thing.

In the end, whether you have Disco Fever or not, if you survived the era, that alone is a victory. But if you want to know where I sort the true disco lovers from those who can merely recall songs of the late 70s, it’s with a single by Dan Hartman called “Instant Replay.” If you get happy feet when you hear that song, you’ve got the Fever. I've talked to my doctor about it and the only known cure is to dance until it goes away.