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When I hear the phrase, “You’ve come a long way, baby” I think of the Virginia Slims ad campaign. I like the celebration of women’s emancipation. However, I find the use of smoking as a platform to promote women’s emancipation as ironic. But I digress.

We have all come a long way. If you have been keeping records, compare your current photo with one from five or ten years ago. Compare your writing today with the writing from even a couple of years ago. Compare how you deal with tough situations today versus how you used to deal with them early in your career.

Keep a journal so you can track your progress. Keep your documents in an archive so you can fish them out. Not all memories will be pleasant, but you will perhaps be surprised by how bad you were compared to today, and how much better you are today. More important, you may be even more surprised to see how good you were at the time.

You will thus learn to view yourself as an evolving being. You will understand the importance of being open so you can adapt and learn. You will hopefully, be more gentle with yourself when you see a mistake.

Yes, you have indeed come a long way. Women and men alike.