March 2015 Leadership Reflection

March Leadership Reflection

Women’s History Month: Mothering Sunday

        March is Women’s History Month, and in honor of this occasion, I’d like to share with you some reflections about all the unsung heroines who have shaped and molded the leaders of each rising generation: mothers! March 15^th is Mothering Sunday – a holiday that originated in England as a “family reunion day.” Mothering Sunday, which is celebrated on the fourth Sunday in Lent, began as a day when domestic servants and children enrolled in boarding schools were allowed to return to their families for a day. It became customary for people to bring gifts of food and flowers to their mothers as tokens of appreciation on this day, which served as a precursor to the modern American Mother’s Day (on the second Sunday in May). A simnel cake (pictured below, and baked with white flour, sugar, butter, eggs, fragrant spices, dried fruits, zest and candied peel) is a traditional gift brought to mothers by their children on Mothering Sunday.

        Here’s a heartfelt, poetical tribute to all those intrepid heroines who have mothered us and taught us the first principles of leadership: fair play, courtesy, sharing, and caring.

The Hand That Rocks the Cradle Is the Hand That Rules the World (Published in 1865)

By William Ross Wallace (1819-1881)

1. Blessings on the hand of women!

Angels guard its strength and grace,

In the palace, cottage, hovel,

Oh, no matter where the place;

Would that never storms assailed it,

Rainbows ever gently curled;

For the hand that rocks the cradle

Is the hand that rules the world.

2. Infancy’s the tender fountain,

Power may with beauty flow,

Mother’s first to guide the streamlets,

From them souls unresting grow –

Grow on for the good or evil,

Sunshine streamed or evil hurled;

For the hand that rocks the cradle

Is the hand that rules the world.

3. Woman, how divine your mission

Here upon our natal sod!

Keep, oh, keep the young heart open

Always to the breath of God!

All true trophies of the ages

Are from mother-love impearled;

For the hand that rocks the cradle

Is the hand that rules the world.

4. Blessings on the hand of women!

Fathers, sons, and daughters cry,

And the sacred song is mingled

With the worship in the sky –

Mingles where no tempest darkens,

Rainbows evermore are hurled;

For the hand that rocks the cradle

Is the hand that rules the world.