I couldnt help but notice that Helen Gurley Brown died on Annie Oakleys birthday this past week. What came to mind immediately was something my mother used to sing to me when I was a teenager:

Oh you cant get a man with a gun, as the Irving Berlin song goes. With a gun, with a gun. No, you cant get a man with a gun.

Relax, NRA sharp shooters, Mom was talking in metaphor. That kind of independence, she figured, was frowned upon when trying to land a man. It was intimidating and emasculating.

But this was a time (the late 1970s) when Gurley Brown and Gloria Steinem and even The Mary Tyler Moore Show were well-entrenched in our culture and delivering other messages to balance that out. It was this Gurley Brown line of thinking that influenced me:

The message was: So youre single. You can still have sex. You can have a great life. And if you marry, dont just sponge off a man or be the gold-medal-winning mother. Dont use men to get what you want in life -- get it for yourself.

It surprises me how even today some of my life coaching clients especially those of my generation -- dont get this way of thinking. Some do and could pretty much teach courses in how to be strong, vibrant, independent and female, but I find others struggle with their identity as it relates to the social order of things. Their self image is often tied up in roles where they are in relationship to others mother, wife, daughter. Not so much seeing themselves as a whole person who may be all of those things.

As a coach, I love the challenge of this kind of client. Sometimes a divorce, illness or death forces them into building their own lives and they thrive. In some cases what is initially loneliness turns to solitude, a wholly different experience. It allows for room to reflect, to attract new things and people, and to reconnect with interests they once loved and began to neglect.

We all have those individuals weve met or admire from afar who have helped propel us along our path. I like to collect examples, from my life and others, so that I can have one at the ready when a client needs a boost from a real, tangible individual who overcame or accomplished something. I want to at the very least get them nodding and at the most give them a push to action on their own goals.

For instance, upon discovering then-New York Times op-ed columnist Anna Quindlen, I was buoyed by the idea of another New Jersey Italian-American woman, also raised Catholic, having a voice in that forum. It validated my own decision to become a columnist.

Ironically one of my earliest female influences -- Roman Catholic nuns -- has resurfaced as a great inspiration this summer. They are currently under fire from a Vatican Doctrinal Assessment with regard to a number of issues, including the question of womens ordination, their approach in ministering to homosexuals and a prevalence of certain radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith in speakers they invite to conferences.

Read more:
Life Lessons from an Editor, a Sharp Shooter and Some Nuns