As a combined birthday/Christmas present, my friend Holly gave me a Ruth Bader Ginsburg action figure.

After seeing the recent documentary and watching special news segments about her, I have found myself in awe of her bravery, intellect, and tenacity.

Although an important public figure of rare status (only nine people hold the same job at the same time), I admit to being surprised by her recent popularity, earning her the nickname, the Notorious RBG.

Looking at the boxed collectible, her likeness as a 5” doll decked out in her judge’s black robe and jabot (white lace collar), sporting her unmistakable dark-framed eyeglasses, with gavel, as accessory in a plastic bubble nearby, I have to laugh.

As I hosted a family gathering Christmas Eve, I displayed my RBG action figure in a prominent place on my bar, near a blooming poinsettia.

Everyone who saw it smiled or laughed out loud.  We shared comments about what we found special or amazing about her.

Who would think that an 85 year-old woman from Brooklyn, a mother and grandmother, an opera lover, with a quiet voice and respectful style of communicating would be such a rock star?

Yes, she survived several bouts of cancer, the loss of her soul mate, and more than a few POTUS tweets disparaging her ability to continue in her role on the bench as she ages, but those facts are merely footnotes in a bio that’s still being written.

When I contemplate her life and why she is so inspirational to me, I can say that I’m impressed with:

• How she lives guided by her values.
• Her dry sense of humor.
• Her thoughtfulness in speech and actions.
• Her ability to discuss things objectively with people she disagrees with.
• Her bravery in speaking the truth and her clarity of understanding, taking on the important task of writing dissenting opinions as well as majority opinions, knowing that getting an argument on the record is important to history even when a short-term outcome has been lost.
• Giving 110% to everything she does.

She stood out in college and law school as having a sharp legal mind, but her reputation was not just built on academic excellence. She took action.

The victim of discrimination herself, she became an advocate and champion of the idea that it is good for the individuals concerned and good for society that all people can reach their potential.

I suppose she’s a hero to me because she embodies some things that I don’t think I could ever accomplish.  She’s made law and advocacy her life’s work and, already spanning decades, doesn’t plan on retiring or slowing down.  In my eighties, I think that stamping my passport in different destinations will be my main preoccupation.

She’s also a hero, I suppose, because there are many examples I can take from how she’s chosen to live her life that I can integrate into how I want to live mine.

She’s a champion of incremental victories.

Some of this is the nature of law and culture.

Issues come up for debate based on specific cases.  Not every dispute becomes a landmark case,  but every big decision comes out of the series of preceding decisions and arguments.

There are winners and losers of cases, conservative and more progressive interpretations of the law, but history cannot go backwards.

I am inspired by the Notorious RBG.  She is so different, but not completely unlike me.  I look to her as an example of how to become a hero to myself.

There will always be unpredictable events that spark unanticipated changes, but so much happens by people simply showing up every day and doing their job, by being willing to do the work…by building on incremental victories.

With or without a gavel, giving voice to your values and focusing on what’s in front of you right now, appreciating all the things that allow you to move one step further in the right direction, is no small thing.