Picking up from yesterday –
Another thing the book made me think about is really looking out for other women, and make sure they’re also leaning in.
For example (back to my work): I have this one lovely female co-worker. She’s incredibly polite, kind of quiet, but always does a great job.
Our office was in the midst of construction during our time there. So, sometimes we’d get there and be in a new room sharing a table with someone. Sometimes we’d get there and have our own space. You never really knew what you were in for.
One night, her computer got moved into this really hot room that was right next to a machine room which had a crazy loud cooling system. So, if you were at this poor girl’s desk, all you could do was sweat all day from the heat coming out of the back of that cooling system – cooking your tiny room, and go nuts because of all the noise.
I felt really bad for her, but I had no ability to move her. She quietly complied with her new space and didn’t complain one bit.
The next day, she came in and her computer had been moved to a nice private back office. (Swanky, I know.) We were all jealous. But she had basically earned it after that night of horribleness.
But, as soon as she got the back office, she started offering it up! She timidly didn’t believe she deserved something so nice, and was trying to give it away!
Now, I know that luck of the draw and being promoted to an office are two different things. But still. Someone has to take that office, and it might as well be her, especially considering she deserves a reward for suffer through her pretty crappy working conditions without complaint.
A part of me wanted to take that office and run! But instead, I stopped her immediately as she tried to give it away. I basically told her to lean in!
Finally, the book made me think about how women are not only pressured, but men are too. Part of the reason that women statistically do more of the housekeeping and child-rearing is because we as a society put pressure on men to be these insensitive guys who don’t feel it’s their responsibility to do half of the work at home.
She shared this anecdote about a co-worker bragging to a group of guys that on the day his child was born, he was already out playing sports with the guys. That’s how little he cared. One of the male co-workers actually piped up to tell him that was a silly thing to brag about, and not cool.
What does it say about us a society that we’ve conditioned men to think it’s cool to care as little as possible about their kids?
What are we teaching our young men? I would recommend that the next time we interact with a boy in our life – whether it be as his mentor, teacher, parent, coach, aunt, whatever – that we really make sure it’s known that it’s okay to show love, kindness, and compassion.
It’s okay to want to help take care of other people and not expect to be taken care of. It’s more than okay to choose to be a stay-at-home dad if that’s what that boy grows up to be.
While it’s important to encourage women to lean in (and as women to do that leaning), I think it’s important to encourage men to lean into their home lives as well.
(And it should probably go without saying that we need to think about how we treat young women as well – which is also talked about in the book.)
Unrelated to that last idea, I am utterly fascinated by the role the media plays in
a) how women think/feel about themselves.
b) how other people think/feel about women.
And while googling a little for this blog post, I found this really interesting site Geena Davis started that has some interesting (but unfortunately very unsurprising) statistics about women in the media (in front of and behind the camera).
Do you have any thoughts about Lean In, or generally the way females (or males) are treated in our society?