Ep #31: Rules for Working Women (& Why We Should Break Them)
episode summary
Working women like us face a set of unwritten rules. We are expected not just to "do it all" but to make it look easy, too.
When we can't meet these (ridiculous!) expectations, we end up feeling badly about ourselves.
I often hear my clients say things like "everyone else can do this, why can't I", proving that each woman believes she is the only one who can't "do it all".
With the help from Brene Brown's research, and an unexpected lesson from a Barbie movie, we will talk through these societal rules and pressures. We'll shine a light on these expectations and talk about how they can affect how we see ourselves.
But don't worry, it's not all bad news! In the second part of our journey, we'll focus on how to overcome these challenges. I'll share my own experiences with these hard standards, including the times when I felt bad about myself and alone because I couldn't meet them.
We'll discuss the power of telling our own truths and how connecting with others and having meaningful conversations can help us change the story for working women everywhere. Let's be bold, be brave, and start making a difference.
Featured on the Show
Daring Greatly by Brené Brown
Email Michelle: michelle@michellegauthier.com
Michelle Gauthier Coaching on Instagram
For the full show notes and transcript, head over here.
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CHAPTERS:
2:31 - The Unwritten Rules for Women
7:03 - Shame vs. Guilt
12:02 - New Rules
listen to the episode:
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Hey, I'm Michelle Gauthier and you're listening to the Overwhelmed Working Woman podcast. Hello friends, I am jumping right into the meat of it today because I am all kinds of worked up about all of the standards and rules, unwritten rules, expected rules, that we, as working women, women in general, are supposed to follow. These rules, again, are not written down anywhere. They are actually impossible for us to follow. So today I'm going to tell you what those rules are. I'm going to cite two really important references. One is world-renowned researcher Brene Brown, who talks all about shame, and the other is from the Barbie movie, Two different examples of the types of standards that women are held up against. And I'm going to also talk about, like I always do on this podcast, what should we do about it. Whether you're feeling shame or like you aren't enough because of these standards that you're not meeting - because no one can, because they're impossible - I will talk to you about what it feels like to be in shame about that and how to get yourself out of shame and how to start talking to other women about this, because when we feel like we're alone, it's not only painful but also completely isolating. How is that for a depressing intro? I promise this is going to end on a positive note, and that positive note is that we don't have to do this anymore. We don't have to play this game. When I'm referring to these unwritten rules that we're supposed to follow as women, here's what I'm talking about. I'm first going to read you this passage from a book of Brene Brown called Daring Greatly. She is, as I mentioned before, a world-renowned researcher on the topic of shame. She has her own podcast, lots of books, et cetera, and she does her research based on interviewing people and talking to them. She did this big study with women about what causes them to feel shame. What she essentially learned from doing these is that women have this expectation like - the overall answer to the question is that women feel like there's an expectation for them to be able to do everything basically perfectly, and to also make it look like it's not hard. Not only do everything, but also make it seem like it's a breeze and like you never broke a sweat. I'm going to read you from her book the bullet points about what the rules are for women that end up causing shame when we're unable to meet them. Notice for each one of these that they're basically impossible. Okay. So the first one is be perfect, but don't make a fuss about it and don't take time away from anything like your family or your partner or your work to achieve your perfection. If you're really good, perfection should be easy. Next one don't upset anyone or hurt anyone's feelings, but say what's on your mind. Next one dial the sexuality way up after the kids are down, the dog is walked and the house is clean, but dial it way down at something like a PTO meeting. Just be yourself, but not if that means being shy or unsure. There's nothing sexier than self-confidence. And then, in parentheses, especially if you're young and smokin' hot. Don't make people feel uncomfortable, but be honest. Don't get too emotional, but don't be too detached, either. Too emotional and you're hysterical, too detached and you're a cold-hearted bitch. So you can see that if you're trying to follow any of these rules - let's just pick a single one of them: don't upset anyone or hurt anyone's feelings, but say what's on your mind. You can either try not to upset anyone or hurt anyone's feelings or say what's on your mind, but doing those together at the same time is absolutely impossible, which immediately will make you fail that and every other rule on this list. T hese rules - who knows where they got started on being created? I never read these rules, I never agreed to these rules, but I just started playing the game without even meaning to, and this is a game that you can't win. So once you start playing, the only thing you can get from this game is failure and shame for not being able to play this game and win this game. If you've seen the Barbie movie, you might remember the speech that America Ferrara does towards the end of the movie. If you haven't seen the movie, it is so good. I saw it with my daughter because she wanted to see it and I was expecting just to have a fun time because I was with her. But I loved the movie. I cried. I cried during this part where America Ferrara was talking about how hard it is to be a woman, and I thought there were so many good and funny points in the movie where they talked about the standards that women are supposed to live by, and by laughing at it it just makes you feel better to know that it's absolutely ridiculous. So I'm going to read you part of the speech where she's talking about that it's impossible to be a woman. These are again similar to the ones that Brene Brown found in her research, because they're paradoxical and they put the person trying to follow these rules into a bind, because the rule itself is contradictory. So here they are. "You have to be thin, but not too thin, and you can never say you want to be thin. You have to say you want to be healthy, but you also have to be thin. You have to have money, but you can't ask for money because that's crass. You have to be a boss, but you can never be mean. You have to lead, but you can't squash other people's ideas. You're supposed to love being a mother, but don't talk about your kids all the damn time. You have to be a career woman, but also always looking out for other people. You have to answer for men's bad behavior, which is insane, but if you point that out, you're accused of complaining. You're supposed to stay pretty for men, but not so pretty that you tempt them too much or that you threaten other women because you're supposed to be part of a sisterhood. But always stand out and always be grateful, but never forget the system is rigged. So find a way to acknowledge that the system is rigged, but also always be grateful. You have to never get old, never be rude, never show off, never be selfish, never fall down, never fail, never show fear, never get out of line." And at the end of it, she just says, "It's too hard, it's too contradictory. Nobody gives you a medal or says thank you, and it turns out, in fact, that not only are you doing everything wrong, but also everything is your fault. I'm just so tired of watching myself and every other woman tie herself into knots so that people will like us. Woo. Okay, If you hadn't already seen the movie and that's the first time you heard it performed by me, sorry, not nearly as good as the actress, but just reading that it just makes me furious and it makes me sad because it's so true. All of those rules are things that we are supposed to follow and they are all impossible. Let's talk about why playing this stupid game is seriously bad for our mental health, because when we believe we are not doing it all the things on both of those lists that I just read to you we feel shame. This isn't my opinion. I mean, it is my opinion, but it's also backed up by real research. The biggest thing that creates shame for women is when they can't do it all and make it look easy at the same time. Let's just talk a little bit about shame. So shame, as far as what it is as an emotion or a feeling, is thinking something about yourself like, I'm bad, I'm wrong, I'm flawed, and it's really your thoughts about you as a human. Another part of shame, when you're in that shame, when you believe you're bad or flawed, is that it leads you to believe that you aren't worthy of love or connection with others, that you're alone in your badness, your wrongness, your flaw. Guilt, on the other hand, which is - sometimes guilt and shame get a little bit confused - guilt is believing you have done something wrong, like your behavior is wrong, not that *you* are wrong. So an example that Brene Brown gives let's say you're taking a test and you fail a test. Shame is saying I am stupid, where guilt is saying it was a bad move to go to the party instead of study for this test. So if you see the difference between those two, shame is about believing something is wrong with you, fundamentally wrong with you, and because of that, believing that you aren't deserving of love or connection. So the shame that comes from being a woman who isn't able to pull off the I'm perfect and it's easy game is something like I'm not enough or I'm flawed or I'm doing it wrong, and that can cause lots of problems. Like I said, shame is really isolating. I felt a lot of shame when I was trying to get pregnant and I couldn't. I did not realize - because now I know so much about this kind of stuff - but I did not realize that what I was thinking was, "I'm supposed to be able to have a baby, no problem, like that's not even part of the problem. Then, once I have the baby, I'm supposed to be able to still keep going on this busy, great career and make it all look flawless." And I couldn't even get started on the first part of that, which was having a baby. And in my mind that made me think I'm flawed, something is wrong with me. It also made me isolate myself from my friends and my family who cared about me, because I felt like I was alone. I was the only one who ever felt this way and I didn't want to talk about it. It seemed like it was really easy for everybody else and frankly, I was ashamed, embarrassed, kind of mortified that I couldn't make this work for me. Now I wish at that time that I had had anyone a coach, a therapist, anybody to encourage me to go to a support group of some kind. That could have helped me see that this was simply shame and that I was deciding that I was flawed based on the fact that it was hard for me to get pregnant. So I'm sharing my story with you to say if you feel like you're in shame about something so, for example, if you're an overwhelmed working woman and you feel down on yourself for not being able to do it all, the best thing that you can do is, first of all, just realize that you're feeling shame around a rule or norm that you're breaking because it's impossible, and the other cure for that is to connect with someone. So maybe that's just talking to a friend, maybe that's telling another woman, oh my gosh, I'm so overwhelmed, I'm really struggling with this. I can't tell you how many times I have said that to people and they are surprised, like, oh my gosh, you struggle with this, too? Yeah, we all struggle with this. So if you feel like you're in shame, first of all just notice that. That's what it is. Notice the "rule" I'm using air quotes that you're breaking. That's causing the shame Laugh about the ridiculousness of the rule. If you can get there and then connect with someone, a group of people, a trusted friend, Connect and talk about this. Here's what else I propose that we do about this is that we make some new rules that we can agree to live by. When I think about the rules that I and my peers are trying to live by, I don't want us to pass this along to our daughters. I feel like the younger generation, like the girls who are in high school now. They have already gotten so much smarter about body image and loving their bodies than we were at that age. So I think there is definitely hope that we can stop these ridiculous norms. So I think what we need to do is come up with a new rule, because the rule that we're all struggling to meet right now, and will continue to, and do not wanna pass on, is the idea that we need to do everything, we need to do it perfectly, and we need to make it look easy. So we have to basically be perfect. So the new rules I think we need to live by are just to be imperfect and authentic. Speak your own truth, and don't think about what other people think about you. If you like this idea but you don't know how to do that, how to get to the point where you're living your life in an imperfect, authentic way, where you really don't care what other people think, I can help you. That is totally what I specialize in. I used to suffer with so much of that and now I don't anymore and I help women do that all the time. So set up time to talk to me if you want to stop out of those rules. The other thing we can do is just keep talking about this. So share this podcast with your female friends and ask them if they're willing to stop trying to live by these ridiculous norms and rules that are causing all of the women in the world who are following these to feel totally overwhelmed and less- than and shame-y. Tell your daughters, model it to your daughters, that you are just an imperfect, authentic human. And then, finally, don't forget to tell other people when you're feeling overwhelmed or when you notice that you're struggling against these rules. If you can create your own pod of your friends to talk about this and joke about this and laugh at the fact that we even try to live by these norms, then you're gonna feel a lot better and your friends are gonna feel a lot better and you're gonna have a lot more realistic expectations for what you can do. I wanna know what you guys think about this. The only downside of having a podcast is that I can't immediately talk to you or get your feedback, or you can't comment on it like it's a post. But I wanna know what you think about this. I would absolutely love if you would send me an email or send me a DM on Instagram. My email is michelle@ michellegauthier. com and my Instagram is @Michelle GauthierC oaching. I'd love to hear what you have to say and I would love for us all to stick together in stopping this madness. We don't have to do this anymore. Okay, thank you so much for listening today and tuning into the podcast. If you like what I'm talking about here, I would absolutely love if you could take the time to leave a rating and review. It's so important when you're a podcaster because there are so many millions of podcasts, and so if you take the time to like and share my podcast, it helps get the word out to so many other women and, as you can tell by this podcast episode today, I feel very passionate that I want all the women to stop feeling overwhelmed and stop feeling shame, because we are already awesome and we just need to embrace that. I hope you have a great day and I'll see you next week! Thank you for listening to the Overwhelmed Working Women podcast.
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