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Success Stories - Our Athenas

• Yuja Wang
  Yuja Wang began playing piano at age four, studied seriously at seven, lived alone in a foreign country at fifteen ...
• Eva Shaw
  Eva Shaw isn’t satisfied with being the best-selling author and/or ghostwriter of over seventy books and thousands...
• Caroline Watson
  Founder and Director of the Hua Dan Project, a theatre-based social enterprise that empowers China's migrant worker...
• Jane Goodall
  Ethnologist, Primatologist and Founder of the Jane Goodall Institute, who forever changed how humans

• Have found a new and exciting way to do something really ordinary.
• Have taken an unconventional or even unpopular path to do what she really loves.
• Have made some kind of sacrifice to take care of her family, to follow her heart, or to do what she felt was right.
• Have made some kind of difference in her community, her country, her planet, or all three.
• Have made that extra effort for her career, her family or the world around her.

Yoga, meditation, self-help books – we spend our lives seeking a balance that is always just out of reach, all the while convincing ourselves that no matter how successful we are, it’s never enough. Women of the world need confidence, to recognise our achievements, and most importantly, to celebrate each other. Min Chan was born in China, but moved to the US, Nancy Pellegrini is an American who now lives in Beijing. However, in our travels we have discovered some immutable truths: that success is what you make it, and that role models are all around us. Even though we live on different continents, we began a trans-ocean collaboration on this project whose time was long overdue.

WMSM honours this planet’s Athenas (named for the Greek goddess of wisdom and defensive war), extraordinary women who follow their hearts, play by their own rules and inspire everyone around them. These are their stories.