Happy International Women's Day!

Today is the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day.  This commemoration was first started in 1911 in various countries in Europe in order to serve as a rally to end discrimination against women.  You can read more about the history of the women's movement and the start of International Women's Day at the official website.

I've been reading a lot of posts throughout the blogosphere about this day, and I want to draw your attention to a couple notable ones.

First, if you haven't read the book Half the Sky by the husband and wife journalist duo Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, please kindly get on it.  Add it to your Kindle, Nook, bedside table queue, whatever.  Heartbreaking, yet inspiring, the book tells the stories of women facing challenges head-on around the world.  Kristoff and WuDunn discuss poverty, health care, female genital mutilation, and child prostitution, in addition to other atrocities that are being dealt with under the leadership of many fearless women and even a few fearless men.  Check out the link to the Half the Sky movement website here, and to Nicholas Kristof's New York Times post for International Women's Day here.

Inspired?  Think about helping a woman out of poverty by sponsoring a small business through microfinance by giving to Kiva.

Half the Sky is required reading on the rather tangible plight of women's inequality around the world.  However, what about the more intangible inequalities faced by women here in the United States?

Ariana Huffington's post on International Women's Day spoke to me greatly.  Here's a link.  Though at first glance it may seem like we've fought for and won the same rights as men over the past one hundred years, the fact remains that we are still trying to figure out what our hard-earned women's liberation actually means.  Huffington describes the clash of being a woman with the masculine traits that appear to be required to succeed in our professions.  Sound familiar to anyone?  It sure does to me.

I know I've mentioned this before, but after you read these blog posts, give to Kiva, and read Half the Sky, consider...no...do find a mentor and then become a mentor to a woman yourself.  It's a tough world out there, and it helps to have a guide, or to be a guide.

I dedicate this post to an incredible woman who has mentored me since I moved to the Eastern Time Zone (heck, even before I moved), and who shows me every day how to traverse a difficult male-dominated landscape with grace, while still being true to herself.  Thank you.

Happy International Women's Day!