“If your dreams do not scare you, they are not big enough.”
—- Ellen Johnson Sirleaf

Now, how’s that for a thought?

Elected President of Liberia after the Republic had been racked by fourteen years of brutal civil conflict, it was on January 16, 2006, that Ms. Johnson Sirleaf was sworn in as Africa’s first woman President.

At one time she was married to a physically abusive man, had four sons and nothing but drudgery on her horizon.

Her incredible rise to eminence has included, amongst so many things: surviving prison lock up, being spared a beach side execution 13 of her colleagues didn’t and living in exile. She jointly shared winning the Nobel Peace prize in 2011; is listed as the 70th most powerful woman in the world by Forbes; in 2010, Newsweek listed her as one of the ten best leaders in the world, while Time counted her among the top ten female leaders. She is the recipient of numerous, numerous awards.

How’s that for turning your life around?

Some of us members of the American International Women’s Club of Cologne met to discuss Ms. Sirleaf’s memoir This Child Will Be Great: Memoir of a Remarkable Life last week. Not everyone found her to be very personable, but it is clearly not her life’s mission to be everybody’s darling. Everyone did agree that this no nonsense woman has displayed an incomparable determination to succeed. She’s tough. She is inspirational.

Being myself a Menopausebarbee, I just wanted to know one thing about this 76 year old dynamo which caused the group to erupt into laughter and that was: when does she take a nap?

As a side note, did you all know that Liberia was founded originally by freed African American slaves who settled the country in the early 19th century?

It appears to be that today Monrovia, the capital of Liberia is the best part of the country to live in. Sina, who works for medica mondiale and returned to Germany about half a year ago says that electricity is turned off at at 6 pm until 8 am the following morning. Generators, if they are to be had, fill the void.

I was thinking about that. It could be that having no electricity during the dozing hours may not be such a bad thing, for it is in our reposed state that we have visions - those things we call dreams and

“If your dreams do not scare you, they are not big enough.”

. . . Shake yourself up and dream big!