He quotes Shirley Conran, the British author and journalist, who wrote the 1975 book, Superwoman, in which she famously said "life's too short to stuff a mushroom". She was lamenting the implicit message our culture is peddling that women who aren't able to shine in both their job and as mothers (while doing something esoteric on the side like learn Japanese) are somehow inadequate.
Krznaric brings a male perspective to the issue and reframes it as being relevant to both parents. He thinks "can women have it all?" is the wrong question to be asking (I agree), and argues that the question should instead be:
"How can parents support each other so they can both have some of it all?"I was at a drinks function after work one night last week and met two other women who were both qualified lawyers, one was looking after her children full time and one was working part time after returning from maternity leave. This topic came up in conversation and I mentioned the "you can have it all, just not all at once" idea and they both said "that's what Quentin Bryce said".
Quentin Bryce is Governor-General of the Commonwealth of Australia, and a pretty remarkable, inspiring woman. She said this in an interview in 2008 (you can see it here). My favourite quote is this, and I think it's relevant to men and women:
"For a very long time now I've been saying to young women, you can have it all, but not all at the same time. How important it is to take very good care of yourself, of your mental and physical and spiritual wellbeing, it's hard to do. It's easier to be a workaholic than to have a truly balanced life. It's very tough for a lot of women teetering on that tight rope of balance and balancing too many responsibilities."
How true. It's so easy to let work take over sometimes, and so much harder to stop it.
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