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While the sessions are informative and there's always something to do, I attend BlogHer conferences for the people. And what people they are! I know that when I go, I will be inspired by the women -- by who they are and what they do -- and they never fail me. I have three examples of inspirational women that I’d like to share from this weekend. In no particular order:
Inspiring woman #1: Lisa Stone, one of the three founders of BlogHer
On Saturday night, I was reading my Twitter feed and saw that Sarah (a DC-area blogger that I’ve met on a number of occasions; she's also a fellow BlogHer writer) had sent this Tweet:
Every time I talk to Lisa Stone I feel empowered.
I immediately responded that I’d had the same experience a few days before. I saw Lisa on Thursday night, and as she usually does when I see her, she gave me a hug, asked me how I was doing, and said something nice about my writing. But this particular time, in the few seconds we had to talk privately during a busy cocktail party, she gave me a compliment that I wasn’t expecting. She also made a suggestion about something she thinks I should do -- or that she knows I’m at least capable of doing -- which was completely unexpected. I don’t want to go into exactly what we talked about, but I was very close to getting teary-eyed.
It’s a pretty incredible feeling when someone recognizes that you’re capable of more than what you’re currently doing. It’s not that I would be content to stay in my current situation for months or years to come, but for someone to point out that I need to do more, be more, and take advantage of my strengths -- that’s a massive motivator for me.
Inspiring woman #2: Kay Stewart
I went to dinner with a group of people on Friday night, and one of the attendees was Kay, a woman I met at the BlogHer ’08 conference in San Francisco. I was happy to see her; I had a great time talking to her last year and I was hoping she’d be a part of our group again this year. Kay’s in her early 60s and has five children, so it may not seem like we’d have a lot in common -- but it's definitely true that two people who don’t seem to be anything alike can have a great conversation and recognize common interests.
However, having a great conversation wasn’t the only good thing that happened that night. We’d all just heard the announcement that next year’s BlogHer ’10 conference will be taking place in New York City. I mentioned that it doesn’t take me very long to get to NYC from DC, and that I’d recently gone there with some friends to see a Broadway show. (I didn’t write very much on my personal blog about the specifics of seeing Wicked, but it was the most spectacular show I’ve ever seen. It absolutely floored me.)
After Kay listened to me rave about my experience for a few minutes, she issued me a challenge. She said that before she sees me next summer at BlogHer ’10, she wants me to have seen at least two more Broadway shows. I can see them both in the same weekend, or even on the same day, but I have to see at least two. Bonus points if I see more than two.
I love to be challenged. (Did Kay know that? I don’t know, but I think she could tell that I’m the type of person who’d be open to taking her up on it.) It’s not that I need people to tell me what to do before I initiate something in my life; I just see it as someone recognizing that I need a push.
As soon as she said what she did, I got excited. It’s one of those times where I immediately thought to myself, Of course. Why don't I? Of course I should. She may have come up with the challenge out of the blue, but she said it with assurance. And you know what? I don’t want to let her down, but most importantly I don’t want to let me down. Whether I go alone or with someone
