I hate my oven. Does anyone else? It's never clean and it taunts me as I walk past it. It says 'hey, loser, your life is out of control. You haven't cleaned me since you moved in here (true) and you have failed as superwoman'.
I'm good at challenging unhelpful thoughts and I can change my feelings about things fairly easily, but this oven is getting the better of me at the moment. Even though I've got loads of work to do and another exam to study for, I just had to try cleaning it just now, but no! It's impossible! No product works, and no amount of frantic scrubbing will move the congealed evidence of last week's extra cheesy pizza, or last night's over full lasagne dish.
You may be wondering, 'do I care about this woman's oven?' and I'm thinking, 'why, why, why do I care about something that no-one can see anyway?', but the thing is, it represents something that I've never quite come to terms with. That I'm not superwoman. Why does that bother me? Isn't it society that tells me I should have a brilliant career, amazing children, fantastic husband and beautiful home? (The children and husband are doing fine.) Isn't that all a bit shallow, though, and shouldn't I be able to decide for myself what matters?
Yes, definitely, but it's not as easy as that. The pressure on women to have everything, do everything and be everything is enormous still, despite people talking about how we can now choose which path to take and we will be valued either way (oh yeah?). If you're a career woman who doesn't focus on family and home, you can still be criticised for being 'unfeminine' - get your Cath Kidston pinny back on! - but if you give priority to your family, there is still a real risk of not being taken seriously in the workplace -'still working around the school run, love?'.
So what do we do? We carry on trying to do a bit of everything...and I will carry on hating my oven until society really, non-judgementally, lets women make true choices about work and family. In the meantime, though, I'll also try to do my bit to help women make real choices about their lives and to feel confident about living according to what's really important to them. Deal with that, oven!
I'm good at challenging unhelpful thoughts and I can change my feelings about things fairly easily, but this oven is getting the better of me at the moment. Even though I've got loads of work to do and another exam to study for, I just had to try cleaning it just now, but no! It's impossible! No product works, and no amount of frantic scrubbing will move the congealed evidence of last week's extra cheesy pizza, or last night's over full lasagne dish.
You may be wondering, 'do I care about this woman's oven?' and I'm thinking, 'why, why, why do I care about something that no-one can see anyway?', but the thing is, it represents something that I've never quite come to terms with. That I'm not superwoman. Why does that bother me? Isn't it society that tells me I should have a brilliant career, amazing children, fantastic husband and beautiful home? (The children and husband are doing fine.) Isn't that all a bit shallow, though, and shouldn't I be able to decide for myself what matters?
Yes, definitely, but it's not as easy as that. The pressure on women to have everything, do everything and be everything is enormous still, despite people talking about how we can now choose which path to take and we will be valued either way (oh yeah?). If you're a career woman who doesn't focus on family and home, you can still be criticised for being 'unfeminine' - get your Cath Kidston pinny back on! - but if you give priority to your family, there is still a real risk of not being taken seriously in the workplace -'still working around the school run, love?'.
So what do we do? We carry on trying to do a bit of everything...and I will carry on hating my oven until society really, non-judgementally, lets women make true choices about work and family. In the meantime, though, I'll also try to do my bit to help women make real choices about their lives and to feel confident about living according to what's really important to them. Deal with that, oven!
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