What Woman Inspires You To Rise? (Or, Get On Your Knees?)

When I was young, I watched my mom take care of business. I never saw her pause and ask permission. I never saw her hesitate if it was the right thing to do. I watched her time and time again roll up her sleeves and go face first into what ever it took to get the job done. Then, she'd come home, take off her nylons, sit down and we’d watch Mary Tyler Moore and That Girl with Marlo Thomas.

Women who were fiercely independent and self-supporting shaped my formative years. The narrative of my era was "You've come a long way baby" and I grew up assuming woman had already arrived to a place of equality. It was not until I entered the workforce that I realized how much work was yet undone and that we still had a long way to go baby.

While these women shaped my understanding of what women were capable of, it was really my grandmother (Bubby) who inspires me daily to rise by getting on my knees.

Fifteen years ago I answered a call. The morning of 9/11, somewhere immediately following the first image of building #2 getting hit, I heard instructions loud and clear, “gather women," but I did not know what that meant or what women I needed to gather, but I did know I had no choice in the matter. Soon I had 12 women of diverse faiths sitting in my living room. We called our group S.A.R.A.H. (Mother of All Nations). Our opening question was to describe a woman of our past that inspired us. While women were sharing in a safe and sacred manner, I found myself removed from the circle staring at my hands. I imagined the hands of my grandmother. Her name was Paula and she came here to escape the unrest in Poland in 1922 with an abusive husband and pregnant with my dad, the eldest of three boys. Paula worked as a housekeeper during the day and scrubbed floors at night in Boyle Heights, CA.  It was those hands I was looking at. Not the loving hands of the women who held my dad’s hand, or that made stuffed cabbage, but the hands who, while on her knees, scrubbed and washed away the filth of those who hustled in those hallways during the day. I imagined what it had to have been like to leave three little boys alone, get on a streetcar and do what it took to make ends meet.

It’s my Bubby’s hands I see, and somehow embody, when I find myself tackling a problem or taking on a project that seems daunting, but necessary. I catch myself, like my mom, not hesitating and getting on my knees and doing what it takes to scrub at the filth.

The night of our first S.A.R.A.H. meeting I was looking at my Bubby’s hands with a sense of responsibility to use them well. I could feel her hands ready to pick up a sponge and absorb the needs of the world and get to work. Since that first realization 15 years ago, my Bubby’s hands have done a lot, sometimes picking up more than they could carry but mostly receiving from other’s hands in love and compassion.

There are times that I do not have the specific training to take on a project. However, like my Bubby, I can do the scrubbing. I am willing to get in the hallway and do what it takes.

It may have been Marlo Thomas that gave me my original permission to stand in my own light, or my mom to not hesitate to roll up her sleeves, but "my Bubby" who inspired me to rise by getting on my knees.

Sande Hart
President of SARAH www.sarah4hope.org
Charter for Compassion International Women and Girls Task Force Lead
Compassionate California Chief Compassion Officer

#WomenRise and #CharterWomen