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My dear friend Jen often tells of hearing Elizabeth Elliot on the radio when she was home with her firstborn, having left a nursing career to be a homemaker. Surrounded by those who would have her believe she was wasting her potential she clung to Elizabeth Elliot's assertion that if God has blessed you with children and a husband you need not fret over your 'calling' any longer. You can stop of musing over what your contribution to the world ought to be. It is right there before your eyes. All that is not to say that everyone can readily accept that what is before their eyes is as potentially as monumental as the 'vocation over the hill'.

Mrs. Elliot feels this is be

Being a mom seems to have changed the way the world sees me more than the other way around. Being pregnant really shifts your relationship to society, and then walking around with a baby shifts it again.

I love the feeling that I get from other parents — women in particular — of being a part of the club. Club Sacrifice, you might call it. It’s cool to have camaraderie, warmth, and openness with strangers. I wish that dynamic was more prevalent in general, but I am grateful to have it now.

To take birthing out of women’s hands and deny us the continuum of
eons of wisdom and experience is to eject us from the very seat of our
power. I believe that women in hospitals are prevented from being able
to have normal, healthy birthing experiences because of the
intimidation of being on the clock, being pressured to take drugs to
make it quicker, being inhibited in their movement and activities, and
alienated by a sterile, fluorescent lit, feet-in-the-air type
environment.

You know the classic “performance anxiety” of not being able to pee
or poo because somebody’s watching you? Multiply that by a million! A
cervix is a sphincter after all!

Then to add tragic insult to injury women are numbed through their
great moment of revelation. I believe the act of giving birth to be the
single most miraculous thing a human being can do and it is surely the
moment when a lot of women finally understand the depth of their power
and connection to all of nature. You think it can’t possibly be done,
you think you can’t possibly take the pain, and then you do — and
afterward you look at yourself in a whole new way. If you can do that,
you can do anything.

(1) Be Legitimately Interested: As mentioned above, be interested. Drop whatever you were doing and focus. Stop focusing on the email you were writing or the article you were reading and really listen. Put yourself in the speaker’s place and make his or her problems your own. The speaker will consciously or subconsciously pick up on this and you will learn more from the conversation. However, if you are in the middle of something just a little too important to drop…

(2) Be Honest About Your Time: If you really are in the middle of something important, tell the speaker. Apologize and plan for another meeting where you can ensure your full attention and focus. This will let the speaker know that you appreciate their coming to you and you want to give them your full concentration. It’s much better than lending half-an-ear and not listening well.

But what Dr Mark Cregan is excited about right now is the promise that his discovery could be the start of many more exciting revelations about the potency of breast milk.

He believes that it not only meets all the nutritional needs of a growing infant but contains key markers that guide his or her development into adulthood.

“We already know how breast milk provides for the baby’s nutritional needs, but we are only just beginning to understand that it probably performs many other functions,” says Dr Cregan, a molecular biologist at The University of Western Australia.