Inspired doesn't even cover it.

Today on Twitter, I found a very despondant tweet from my lovely friend Millie - "Overwhelmed by the feeling that nothing makes a difference". Now Millie is one of the most active and passionate people I know, and for her to be down really made me think about how frustrating life can be sometimes, how sometimes it feels like you're just banging your head against a brick wall, or that the whole world is against you. I promise you that the littlest things you can do to make the world a better place are making a difference, the world is constantly changing and reshaping, and its actions both small and large that make that change for the better. And no, its not always easy. Here are some women who made a huge difference, that history somehow forgot... absolutely inspiring, beautiful, pioneering, amazing.

Image Source

Irena Sendler (1910-2008) saved around 2,500 Jewish children from the Warsaw ghetto in the Second World War. Despite being captured and tortured by the Gestapo, she never revealed the identities of the children (who are now grown and living full lives) or her accomplices. She escaped after one of her guards was bribed, and was later nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.

Image Source

Rosalind Franklin is arguably the most important woman in science ever, yet most of us have never heard her name. She was a key player in the team that unravelled DNA, the team that won a Nobel Peace Prize for it in 1962 - but Rosalind had died in 1958, aged just 37, after battling ovarian cancer. The NPP is never awardes posthumously, so Rosalind went entirely unacknowledged until 1968, when her colleagues publicly recognised her hard work.

Image Source

Murasaki Shikubu (c.978-1030 approx) wrote The Tale of Genji, which some say was the first great novel, and others say was the first novel, period. She wrote it (basically inventing the art form of the novel) after her husband died, leaving her a single parent. Tragically, due to her time, very little is known about her, but her novel survives as a literary masterpiece.

You CAN make a difference!!