Self-help books for women are part of a multibillion-dollar industry, sensitively attuned to our insecurities and our purses.

Intensity is not the same as intimacy, although we tend to confuse these two words.

Being able to make a sincere apology - one that says, "Yes, I get it; I screwed up. Your feelings make sense, and I'm taking this seriously" - is at the heart of being successful in leadership, parenting, and friendship, as well as our own integrity and self-worth. And the failure to apologize? Even a good relationship will suffer quietly - because we really feel it when someone won't take responsibility for what they said, or didn't say.

Only through our connectedness to others can we really know and enhance the self. And only through working on the self can we begin to enhance our connectedness to others.

Anxiety is extremely contagious, but so is calm.

Anger is a signal, and one worth listening to.

The term girl not only serves to avoid certain anxiety-arousing connotations inherent in the word woman regarding aggression, sexuality, and reproduction, it also serves to impart a tone of frivolousness and lack of seriousness to ambitious, intellectual, and competitive striving that women may pursue.