20 Quotes From “Lean In” That Will Inspire And Make You Appreciate All The Working Women In Your Life

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1. “If I had to embrace a definition of success, it would be that success is making the best choices we can… and accepting them.”

2. “The time is long overdue to encourage more women to dream the possible dream.”

3. “If a woman pushes to get the job done, if she’s highly competent, if she focuses on results rather than on pleasing others, she’s acting like a man. And if she acts like a man, people dislike her.”

4. “There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help other women.”

5. “I hope you find true meaning, contentment, and passion in your life. I hope you navigate the difficult times and come out with greater strength and resolve. I hope you find whatever balance you seek with your eyes wide open.”

6. “Success and likeability are positively correlated for men and negatively for women. When a man is successful, he is liked by both men and women. When a woman is successful, people of both genders like her less.”

7. “The promise of equality is not the same as true equality.”

8. “We need to stop telling [women], ‘Get a mentor and you will excel.’ Instead, we need to tell them, ‘Excel and you will get a mentor.'”

9. “You have to take opportunities and make an opportunity fit for you, rather than the other way around.”

10. “Gloria Steinem said it best: “You can’t do it all. No one can have two full-time jobs, have perfect children and cook three meals and be multi-orgasmic ’til dawn … Superwoman is the adversary of the women’s movement.”

11. “Bill like a man.”

12. “My hope, of course, is that we won’t have to play by these archaic rules forever and that eventually we can all just be ourselves.”

13. “Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to go through life without being labeled by my gender. I don’t wake up thinking, What am I going to do today as Facebook’s female COO?, but that’s often how I’m referred to by others. When people talk about a female pilot, a female engineer, or a female race car driver, the word “female” implies a bit of surprise.”

14. “Men are allowed to be focused on their own achievements, while loyalty is expected from women.”

15. “In order to protect ourselves from being disliked, we question our abilities and downplay our achievements, especially in the presence of others. We put ourselves down before others can.”

16. “Careers are a jungle gym, not a ladder.”

17. “If you’re offered a seat on a rocket ship you don’t ask what seat. You just get on.”

18. “It is time to cheer on girls and women who want to sit at the table, seek challenges and lean in to their careers.”

19. “We hold ourselves back in ways both big and small, by lacking self-confidence, by not raising our hands and by pulling back when we should be leaning in.”

20. “Knowing that things could be worse should not stop us from trying to make them better.”

thumbnail image – Maegan Tintari