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It was a heady time to be a young woman. The Equal Rights Amendment was in play, and all the work our feminist aunts and older sisters had done to get women into the men’s workplace was ours for the taking. All we had to do was get out there and ask.
Madison Avenue was more than happy to oblige, bombarding us with iconic images of what women were now expected to be:
Madison Avenue was more than happy to oblige, bombarding us with iconic images of what women were now expected to be:
You’ve come a long way, baby.
I think I saw that slogan in one form or another at least 5 times a week. I remember attending a free concert in Central Park where sexy women in Jordache jeans handed us free packs of Virginia Slims. Heaven help us all.
Even my traditionalist mother, who had never worked a day outside the home, was caught up in it. “What an amazing time to be a young woman,” she’d say. “You can be anything you want.”
I swallowed it hook, line and sinker. More. More. Add on more. Give me a full-time job, hobbies, aerobic exercise classes, marriage, babies. I can do it all!
Until one day, I looked like this.
Slow forward did not exist in my world. Everything was fast and faster. The term “Self-Care” had not been invented yet.
It wasn’t until about 5 years after my mother died, after Anne was born, that I started realizing some important things:
- I’d been deluded.
- There was a reason my mother went into the garden and dug in the dirt for her sanity.
- I could find her there.
- Doing less might just be more.
Slowly, slowly, I learned to say “no.” No more committees. No more workshops. “I can’t do that for you right now.” It took me over a decade, and even then, Dave will tell you that I still do too much twenty years later.
I hope that our daughters are finding a better work-life balance than we were able to have. They certainly have role models from those of us who wised up. As my contemporary, Oprah Winfrey now says:
It wasn’t until about 5 years after my mother died, after Anne was born, that I started realizing some important things:
- I’d been deluded.
- There was a reason my mother went into the garden and dug in the dirt for her sanity.
- I could find her there.
- Doing less might just be more.
Slowly, slowly, I learned to say “no.” No more committees. No more workshops. “I can’t do that for you right now.” It took me over a decade, and even then, Dave will tell you that I still do too much twenty years later.
I hope that our daughters are finding a better work-life balance than we were able to have. They certainly have role models from those of us who wised up. As my contemporary, Oprah Winfrey now says:
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