Notes for book clubs and reading groups

Ideas for using this book
Gorgeous Daring Dames is a capacity-building book, designed to be worked through to develop a Daring Dames Action Plan so that readers can grow in confidence, clarity and commitment to their goals.

For reading groups and book clubs, the focus is on the collective experience of the book and the issues it raises. Readers can also work through the book at a personal level.

Groups may wish to use this book as a basis for celebrating a particular event, such as International Women’s Day on 8 March. Or perhaps the life of a suffragette and feminist such as Jesse Street (died 2 July 1970) or Vida Goldstein (died 15 August 1949).

Another option is to start the year with this book in order to establish some goals or New Year Resolutions that will stick.

The book is an extension of a one-day confidence-building program called A Den for Daring Dames. Groups could call the meetings allocated to Gorgeous Daring Dames, A Den for Daring Dames, and use them to focus on aspects of confidence-building raised in the book.

Summary
The raison d’etre for Gorgeous Daring Dames is summed up in the sentence: “My hope is that Gorgeous Daring Dames provides you with the mental nourishment that builds your clarity, courage and commitment to act on your dreams.”

The book is about being a Daring Dame, a woman with courage and confidence to step forward, speak up, reach out for what she wants and make a difference. It aims to present ideas that are within everyone’s reach.

And what is a Daring Dame? She is simply a woman who has a particular mindset. She “realises that things can be different. She realises she has the power to take charge and change things. She’s a doer, for herself and others. She’s looking for a way to be bold enough to do what she wants to do. She’ll tackle life’s challenges. She has the grit to continue despite forces that thwart her progress. And she knows her own mind.”

The book uses a Mental Nutrition® perspective to look at what it means to be confident and provides a framework for developing an action plan that provides direction. Specific issues that many women encounter, including speaking up, ageing, money, beauty, health and fitness, asking, saying ‘No’ and handling criticism, are examined within this perspective.

The book profiles sixteen women from Yass, Burra, Murrumbateman and Canberra (the national capital region), ranging in age from sixteen to sixty, to not only tap the beliefs that enabled them to make a difference, but also to provide a wider range of role models.

The book cautions throughout, however, that while the suggestions are do-able they do take effort, and often sustained effort.

About the author
I have embarked on my third career as a business woman, having previously pursued academic and public sector senior management careers. I am a professional speaker, learning guide (facilitator, workshop leader, coach) and consultant.

I describe myself as Australia’s only Mental Nutritionist® specialising in the ‘sense-making’ process. I created the concept Mental Nutrition® to take understanding about and between people to a higher level of skill, elegance and effectiveness. By drawing on my academic work in communication theory, and experience of managing up to fifty staff, I offer insight into why much of our thinking about communicating is well past its use-by date.

Sense-making is like cartography. Each day we operate on the basis of what we think the world is like and when faced with something new, decide what it means so we can ‘traverse this new terrain’ with minimal effort. We create a map in our minds of how we think the world is, or should be, based on past experience, assumptions, expectations, values and beliefs. Our map doesn’t necessarily match other people’s maps, nor does it exactly match how the world actually is. And much of the misunderstanding and disagreement between people stems from this process.

I have taken an active interest in women’s issues since the 1970s when I campaigned with the Women’s Electoral Lobby to change offensive advertising. Currently I am an active member of the ACT Chamber of Women in Business and am a Director of the YWCA Canberra.

Over the years I observed how women can hold themselves back from being all they could be and reflected on my own fear-inducing experiences. Much of this reluctance stems from the beliefs we choose to hold to hobble, bind and constrain us. This realisation opened the door to applying Mental Nutrition® to confidence-building, and in 2001 I launched the confidence-building program A Den for Daring Dames. Gorgeous Daring Dames extends the workshop’s reach, encouraging women to be bolder, more daring and gutsy.

I am a wellbeing advocate, wanting all Australians to benefit from tapping more of the power of their minds. I live in Australia’s national capital, enjoying all the meaning-making that Canberra has to offer. My other book is How to Address Selection Criteria (3rd edition) and I produced two audio tools, 101 Interview Questions and Affirmations for Interviews & Presentations.

Topics to consider
1. The book is based on a number of assumptions. Do you agree that we understand life by interpreting it and that we construct our own reality? To what extent can we be ‘the mistress of our own destiny’? Do we always have choices? Can you think of any circumstances where there are absolutely no choices at all? Can you accept that no one can make us do anything—they can’t make us happy, angry, embarrassed? What are the implications of this belief for our relationships with friends and family?

2. I describe our ‘comfort zone’ as being like a landscape, with several zones merging into each other. How useful is this metaphor for understanding our degrees of confidence with different elements of life experience? Think of examples that fall into the various layers: the sheepskin rug, the paddock, the swamp, the white water. Compare notes with others in the group. What accounts for the differences? What insight does this discussion provide about responding to people who feel comfortable with things we may feel uncomfortable about or vise versa? For example, if you feel comfortable about mowing the lawn and someone else says they couldn’t work a lawn mower, it’s just too scary or complicated.

3. I make a case for paying closer attention to the words we use. I suggest we have ‘relationships’ with words and that this can be a factor affecting our confidence level. How useful do you find it to explore your relationship with words like success, competition, power, achievement? How much variation is there amongst the group in categorising these words?

4. Part of my purpose throughout the book is to increase the reader’s mindfulness of the beliefs and fears that affect them. The subject of money is a particularly fraught one in terms of the range of beliefs and emotions people have about it. To help women improve their relationship with money, I suggest using a metaphor, such as the garden. What is the range of metaphors that could be applied to money? What are the strengths and weaknesses of each one and what insight do they offer?

5. At the book launch, I explained why I chose the ‘Daring Dames’ profiled in the book:
‘I chose these women because we need more diversity in role models for women. In the mountain range of life, most of the books for women focus on those who are the Everest climbers, at the top end of the range. This is valuable material, however some of us suffer from altitude sickness. We can admire these women from afar, but are not necessarily inspired or motivated by them or to join them. Local women are equally inspiring, and by being closer to us, they provide alternative models that expand our sense of what is possible.’

How do you respond to books that profile Australia’s high flyers? (You’ll find examples listed under Resources at the back of the book.) Can ‘local’ women, perhaps geographically, socially, or economically closer to us, as illustrated in Gorgeous Daring Dames, provide equally inspiring advice and examples of what women can do if they set their minds to it?

6. One of the problematic areas of language that I touch on is the way we separate out people from each other, based on what they do. We use distinctions like average, ordinary, extraordinary, special, heroic. Why are women reluctant to use these terms and receive recognition and honour for what they have achieved? Is the Office of the Status of Women’s Honouring Women project misplaced by focusing on ‘tall poppies’, rather than on ‘local’ women like those profiled in the book?

7. I sees labeling as an important factor in how we define ourselves. Is the image of an invisible garment a useful one in drawing the reader’s attention to this factor? What labels do you know you acquired from other people during your life? Do you still wear them? Is it possible to have a conversation without labeling people? What are the wider implications of labeling people’s behaviour, intentions, personality etc through the media, political statements, and expert comment? Is too much effort put into seeing differences rather than similarities?

8. In the chapter ‘A Daring Dame’s Gorgeous Body’ I point to the extent to which our society focuses on women’s body, and by implication, encouraging dissatisfaction with our bodies. How easy or difficult is it to list 20 things about your body you like or are grateful for? How does this experience vary in the group? Is trying to do something about negative body image a futile exercise?

9. I suggest that we can build confidence by expanding our ‘familiarity spectrum’ through a micro-risk program. What is your experience of doing things you haven’t done before? Do you find it’s more useful to go for the big challenges that are out in the white water rather than take smaller steps or micro-risks? How does this sit with the advice of several of the women profiled to take small steps?

10. My view of wellbeing is that it has much to do with the power of the mind. For optimal wellbeing I suggest regularly ‘feeding the mind’. Based on the range of beliefs referred to throughout the book and their impact on various aspects of our lives (such as health, money, speaking up) are you convinced that the mind is a powerful resource that we could make better use of?

11. Would you see yourself as a Daring Dame? Would you adopt the Daring Dames Mindset? Do you agree that the world needs more Daring Dames? Explore the range of views expressed in the group. How do you respond to my comment: ‘Regrettably, she (a Daring Dame) is still not your ‘average’ person. The average person tends to be a fence-sitter. They see things as okay as they are. They think ‘she’ll be right’. They accept what is and take things as they come.’

[www.mentalnutrition.com]