WUNRN
http://womensenews.org/story/uncovering-gender/150327/why-women-having-it-all-empty-concept
Why to Women, “Having
It All” Can Be an Empty Concept
By Dawna Ballard* & Sunshine Webster*-
WeNews Commentators - March 31, 2015
After all this time, maybe we don't have the answer because it's the wrong
question. Better to wonder: Can we achieve alignment?
(WOMENSENEWS)--
Katharine Zaleski's recent letter of apology to all of the women with whom she had worked
brought up the perennial question of women having it all, which is entirely the
wrong question. While the answers have changed over the years, the basic
challenges have not:
Any answer
will necessarily end up as detrimental and unsatisfying. For example, if we
think the answer is "yes," portrayed in the Enjoli commercial seared
into the (un)consciousness of an entire generation of young girls, we'll be
terribly disappointed. If we think the answer is "no," then where do
we go from there?
The question
also implies that if we chose a "portion" instead of "all,"
we'd automatically be happy. But of course that's wrong. We know plenty of
friends (men and women) without children who feel as overwhelmed as their
parental counterparts. We also have plenty of friends with children who work
primarily inside the home, and they are as exhausted as anyone else.
Closed-ended
questions like "Can women have it all?" seek a simple yes or no response,
ending a conversation, focusing more on limitation than on meaning in our
lives. So let's ask a different question and make it open-ended so we can
invite people to the table and have an extended, interesting conversation,
where we really listen to the answer.
A better
question would also jettison the underlying mathematical, machine-based
metaphor, where "all" quantifies the "it" we are supposed
to acquire, in favor of a metaphor consistent with human life. The concept of
alignment (a basic human need that supports vitality and longevity but is
different for each body) leads us to ask a better question: How can we find
proper alignment?
Watching a
foot race illustrates the various bodily alignments for individual runners. We
do not have the same form or alignment. Rather, we find our unique alignment
through trial, error, practice and help from an experienced other (like a
coach). When we do, running becomes rhythmic and smooth. When we struggle to
find alignment, we struggle with every step.
Alignment is
the positioning of parts in relation to one another. To successfully perform a
number of bodily functions, multiple parts must be aligned. To run, our bodies
align the foot strike with posture, leg and abdominal muscle strength, arm
movements, head tilt, etc. Our body parts are aligned in relation to each other
body part. Proper alignment leads to good form; improper alignment leads to
injury.
Life
alignment works the same way: To achieve it, we position our career, spousal,
parental, social, physical, spiritual and communal activities in relation to
one another. Moreover, each positioning depends upon what we seek out of life,
and this may change over time. When we align our activities with our present
life values, goals and desires we find rhythm.
But if the
alignment metaphor is to be realized, it must also be scaled up and applied to
larger systems, including the family, the community, the workplace and even the
global economy. Notably, finding alignment within a larger system requires us
to see ourselves as inherently interdependent with one another.
For
instance, "Lean In Together"
points to the fact that men and women working in concert with each other
creates a win-win situation for families and corporations. This is a great
start, but we must go further and reconsider how the wage inequity and working
conditions of others across national and socioeconomic boundaries brings us out
of alignment with each other as a global community.
A better question
then, explores specific ways we can achieve alignment. Focusing on this offers
more room to remove limitations and exclusions, exploring solutions rather than
wondering about possibilities.
*Dawna I. Ballard, Ph.D., a Public Voices Fellow, is an associate professor
in the Moody College of Communication in the department of communication
studies at the University of Texas at Austin. Sunshine Webster, Ph.D., is a
wife, mother, writer, teacher, runner, business owner, fundraising chairwoman
and the living embodiment of how proper life alignment makes this all possible.