posted June 28, 2006 04:56 PM              

Self help, surgery, sex? Money, power, career? The options for women now are endless. But has too much choice killed off contentment? By Geraldine Bedell

Sunday June 11, 2006
The Observer

What makes women happy?
Self help, surgery, sex? Money, power, career? The options for women now are endless. But has too much choice killed off contentment? By Geraldine Bedell

We should be the happiest generation of women in history. We can choose whether to have children, and when. We don't need to marry to survive, and if marriage makes us miserable, we can divorce. Interesting and rewarding careers are on offer. We can reasonably expect men to take on a proportion of domestic responsibility. For women of other generations, we would seem to be sitting in front of a smorgasbord of opportunities.

Yet we're not satisfied. It's not so much that we have to make a million choices; more that, having chosen, we are haunted by the possibility that our choices might be wrong. If we stay at home to care for our children, we worry about wasting education and dissipating talent and that no one takes us seriously. If we commit ourselves to careers, we're tormented that our children are suffering because we're not there to help them learn to read and we're late for the nativity play.

As a result, we frequently try to avoid choosing at all, as if it might be possible somehow to have a full-time job, and children, and a good relationship, and friends, and a tidy house, and be thin, and wear the right clothes, and eat in the right restaurants, and possibly be having a really sexy affair as well, complete with suitable underwear... the more we achieve, the more the horizons of achievement stretch away. And we're completely strung out and not actually doing anything properly. We manage on a knife-edge, the whole edifice in permanent danger of collapse. Women are 10 times more likely to be severely depressed than they were 50 years ago, twice as likely as men.

The paradox of the multiple-choice society is that while we wouldn't want to give it up, it doesn't actually seem to make us happy. No one seriously wants to go back to a Victorian hierarchy of female achievement: marriage with children, followed by marriage without children, then governess, then children without marriage. No one wants to return the 1950s, 'Mogadoned-up in the suburbs', as Maureen Rice, editor of Psychologies magazine, puts it. Yet it is undeniable that, in all our striving for perfection, in our sense of ourselves as projects to be tweaked and completed, we have lost sight of how to be happy.

If you actually ask women what makes them happy, they're quite likely to say 'sex', or 'eating' or a 'cold bottle of sauvignon blanc' because sensual pleasures are still as available as they ever were. But the woman who told me that happiness was 'sitting on the sofa with my husband' seemed to be imagining a different quality of experience altogether. Most Indo-European languages make some distinction between short-term pleasure and more persistent happiness (so in Italian, for example, between gioa and felicita) and it is the latter - not the passing moments, but a single and lasting state - that seems so elusive.

More than 2,000 self-help books are published each year. Their message is that the only solution to the happiness-deficit is to get in touch with your true self and find out what makes you, personally, feel good. According to Ben Renshaw of the Happiness Project, which runs positive-psychology programmes, 'the major cause of unhappiness for women in the 21st century is a lack of meaning: What's the point? Too many people climb the perceived ladder of happiness and find it's leaning against the wrong wall. In a manic society, with a lot of external pressures, you're setting yourself up for failure unless you have a well-defined idea of happiness.'

In other words, you need to be clear about your own values. On the self-help shelves of my local bookshop, one of the most prominent titles promises You Can Change Your Life and Create Your Own Destiny. Another will put you in touch with The Life You Were Born To Live. A third urges Ask And It Is Given - Learn To Manifest Your Desires. Implicit in all these come-ons is the idea that, if you can only strip out all the social conditioning, the clamour of friends, mothers, in-laws, bosses, partners, the media and everyone else, you will uncover a kind of ur-self with clear ideas of what makes you happy.

Unfortunately, it isn't quite that simple, or not unless your ur-self wants to live in a cave and never speak to anyone again. In deciding to be a full-time mother, for instance, you have to weigh up the fact that, as Oliver James puts it, 'the status and role model of a mother is lower than that of a street sweeper, because any unpaid work is despised and downgraded'. Would more of us be full-time mothers if motherhood were seen as the most glamorous thing we could possibly do? Probably. The self-help books are offering an illusion, because we can't ever entirely strip out the opinions of others. In making our decisions, we compare ourselves to other people all the time, which is why a famous experiment found that far more people would prefer to earn $50,000 in a world in which average earnings were $25,000, than $100,000 in a world in which average earnings were $250,000. We're caught in a bind: we get quite a lot of exhilaration and sense of freedom from our choices - to be fashionable or stylish, live in the city or the country, be married or stay single. Such decisions are crucial to establishing our identity. But we can't escape the fact that all these choices are made in a context, and the idea that we can identify pure preferences that express our innermost souls is absurd.

We turn out to be immensely preoccupied with the preoccupations of other people, as evidenced by our attitudes to beauty. The agony aunt Susan Quilliam says anxiety about appearance is one of the main reasons women write to her. 'Looks are far more closely associated with relationships than they were 20 or 30 years ago. That's largely because the more beautiful we can become, the more being beautiful becomes important. My mother looked older in her early forties than I do in my fifties.'

A century ago, a woman could let her hair go grey and still feel she was making the best of herself. Between the 1950s and 1970s, the proportion of women dyeing their hair rose from 7 per cent to 40 per cent. Then, during the 1970s, an advertising campaign for L'Oreal Preference made dyeing practically mandatory. The campaign slogan, 'Because I'm worth it', ostensibly referred to the slightly higher price of Preference than the market leader, Clairol. But the genius of the ad campaign was to shift the emphasis from dyeing as something women did to fake looking younger than they really were, to something a woman did as a means of self-expression, something she did for herself.

Women who have plastic surgery invariably say, 'I'm doing it for me', and, at one level, they obviously are. According to the plastic surgeon Rajiv Grover, the women who come to him 'aren't vain, narcissistic types who spend all day looking in the mirror. They are people like you and me who have got used to feeling good because they look good.' But it would be foolish to think of 'me' as a pure inner space, untouched by external influences. These women are responding to social norms. (And even women who decide to repudiate conventional notions of beauty - to wear flat shoes, drab clothes, no makeup and a pudding bowl haircut - are making a social statement of sorts.)

It's very difficult to distinguish where the inner woman ends and other people's expectations begin. As the author Carl Elliott says: 'It's one thing to resist oppressive ideas of beauty when they are championed by the enemy. It is quite another when you are convinced that they are your ideals, a part of your authentic self; that remaking yourself in the light of these ideals marks the pathway from shame to happiness. How do you resist the oppressor when he has taken up residence in your own head?'

So those of us who don't want plastic surgery worry that it will soon go the way of hair dye and we'll be submitting to general anaesthetics and having to treat our bodies like the extension on the house - constantly improveable. We compare ourselves with others, and draw all kinds of subtle moral conclusions, even when we're only comparing how we look.

When I go out to lunch three times in a row with a friend who only pushes a lettuce leaf around her plate, I feel unhappy (and at some level, I actually hate her) because I think a) she's more interested in cultivating her thinness than having a good time with me and b) she's implying she has more self-control than I do. And also because she's probably right about that. And finally, because I know she must realise I'll think all this, and she still doesn't care.

We are in competition with women, and we're in competition with men, and it's exhausting - and, if we pause to think about it for a minute, often ugly and demeaning. It's also a no-win situation, because there will always be someone more competent or beautiful and, in an age of global media, they're in our kitchens and sitting rooms, the Nicola Horlicks and Angelina Jolies. 'We know that using your appearance in terms of sheer sexiness is barking up the wrong tree in terms of your mental health,' says Oliver James, who deplores the recent move towards what he calls 'the ladette legitimation of women using physical desirability in all sorts of ways'.

For a forthcoming book, Oliver James interviewed an Oxford undergraduate who claimed that the main preoccupations of her contemporaries were their looks and getting into what were previously thought of as male careers. 'These women will go into investment banks and work ludicrous hours, even harder than the men,' James says. 'These elite women should be the happiest of all, but this doesn't sound conducive to happiness: they will suffer terrific gender strain, because the American version of advanced capitalism has hijacked feminism.'

When even the supposedly cleverest young women are driven by the social expectations that have invaded their heads to make choices that are likely to make them miserable, what hope is there for the rest of us? Is there any possibility of clearing away just a bit of the cultural clutter and identifying what might make for genuine happiness?

One of the first things to understand is that scientists are increasingly reaching that the neural pathways in the brain for desire are separate from those for happiness. In other words, we might desire things that don't make us happy.

This certainly seems of be true of material goods: a huge body of research shows that above a certain level (around £18,000), increases in income only make for short-term happiness before people revert to how they felt before.

In one study, American students were asked what major consumer items they considered essential to the good life (house, car, television et cetera). Then, 16 years later, they were asked again. The number of items they actually owned had gone up in that time (from 3.1 to 5.6) but so had their aspirations, so, for example, a holiday home might now be considered essential. They were still two items short.

This explains why a £25 lipstick can seem crucial to your happiness when you're in Space NK, and then, when your bank statement arrives, you can't really remember why you ever wanted it. Rather like nicotine, the lipstick is only weakly enhancing, biologically speaking: enough to get the dopamine-drunk desire system up and running, but not enough to feed the happiness system, which exists to drive us towards biologically beneficial things. (Similarly, the happiness derived from smoking isn't sufficient to explain why people continue knowingly to kill themselves by doing it.)

'Buying the lipstick can actually be damaging,' says life coach Carole Ann Rice, 'because what you're actually saying is, "oh, sod it". You're absconding from responsibility: "I don't really need this, but I want to feel good about myself this minute." And then you feel guilty afterwards.' Yet we don't learn: when the possessions don't work, we go after yet more possessions. Social scientists call it the hedonic treadmill.

Anna Raeburn recalls that in the 1970s, a disease called kwashiorkor was prevalent in Biafra. 'All the children were malnourished, because they weren't getting any protein, but their mothers didn't realise that was the problem, and they couldn't have got hold of protein anyway, so they kept feeding them starch. The children remained stick-thin and hopelessly malnourished, but with distended bellies. Modern life is like that: we keep feeding ourselves the wrong things for happiness.

It used to be enough to be a good businesswoman. Now we feel we have to be a good businesswoman and a mother, and a wife, and wear the right shoes. And being women, we think that by trying harder, better, in stereo, we'll make things improve.'

Capitalism slips sweetly into the biological gap between desire and happiness, whispering seductively that everything would improve if we only had the handbag, the facelift, the flat, the boyfriend, slept with the boss for a promotion. It encourages us to see other people as tools for our happiness. 'Capitalism encourages us to think of ourselves as commodities and everybody else as commodities too,'

Oliver James says. 'We start using other people instrumentally, to maximise our personal ambitions.' This is probably not very good for our mental health; it's even worse when other people see their lives as projects to be perfected too, and your husband decides his status requires him to be married to someone younger, prettier and better-connected. Oliver James argues that we'd be much better off if Britain were more like Denmark, where men do 35 per cent of childcare and women aren't attracted to workaholics. This may well be true, and may even represent a realistic ambition for the future, but what about the here and now? Are there any general rules for happiness? Is it possible to identify the ingredients, to delineate the lifestyle of a happy woman?

According to Lesley Garner, author of Everything I've Ever Learnt About Love, someone once did a survey and discovered that the key to happiness was to take up Scottish dancing. In fact, this is less daft as it sounds, because Scottish dancing incorporates several things that are known to be conducive to happiness: it is social, it involves exercise, and music, and it is an activity likely to induce a sense of 'flow' - complete absorption in a task so that there's no awareness of passing time. High-flow activities (which might include playing an instrument, gardening, singing in a choir, or writing) are distinguished by being difficult enough to prevent boredom, but not so impossible as to make you want to give up.

Love and friendship score highly on all tests of what makes people happy, although love is obviously also capable of making people very unhappy. When it goes well, love satisfies both the desire for self-fulfilment (love is a search for the self, to the very bottom) and the sometimes contradictory desire for recognition, approval and endorsement of identity. Lesley Garner believes that the kind of love that lasts 'is completely non-negotiable. It's never considering that there's an alternative. It's the ability to get cross without ever falling out. And it's about being more stricken by anxiety for the other person than for yourself.'

Some of the most extensive research on marriage, conducted in Germany between 1980 and 2000, shows that romance, where it leads to practical outcomes, wanting to do things for the other person, is very good for happiness. The German study found that people who married were generally happier than the rest of the population (though there's some debate about whether happy people find it easier to be married). The happiest marriages, though, were based on giving. Relationships formed around a quid pro quo (if you have the kids on Saturday, you can go to the gym on Sunday morning) were less satisfying than those where partners put themselves out for the other person.

One other, much-quoted piece of research suggests (despite what Oliver James has found) that an equal division of labour in marriage doesn't make husbands more affectionate or wives more fulfilled. Among women with jobs outside the home, the happiest were those whose husbands earned at least two-thirds of the household income. There may be all sorts of reasons for this: women may invest more in marriage when they earn less than their husbands: high-earning women may work harder but still, resentfully, do the bulk of the domestic work; unequal finances may allow for a clearer division of roles, and so less day-to-day stress about whose turn it is to do the school run or get the shopping.

There's general agreement that it isn't necessary to be in a relationship to be happy; but in that case, you do need plenty of friends. As the economist Richard Layard puts it in Happiness, Lessons From A New Science: 'People who care about other people are on average happier than those who are more preoccupied with themselves.'

Social embeddedness, as sociologists like to call it, is significant. Members of community organisations tend to be happier than those who are too busy to speak to their neighbours. The Young Foundation recently produced a report which showed that, in the 1950s, a majority of people (60 per ce t) thought others could be trusted. By the early 1980s, the figure was down to 44 per cent, and in today's society of prosperous consumers, it's 29 per cent and falling. This unease affects men and women, but it's arguable that women feel the loss more keenly. We have a memory of our mothers talking over the fence and bumping into people in the high street and the absence of all that feels like loss. It's possible we even feel guilty about it: we're the empathetic ones, more capable of doing the emotional work. We're responsible for what's happened because we've gone off and got jobs and let neighbourliness slip. Yet again, we're just not trying hard enough.

A further reason why women who get involved in their communities are happier may be that they tend to work part-time, so feel more in control of their lives. Ben Renshaw recalls working with Boots a few years ago on the constituents of national wellbeing: 'The most important thing was for people to feel they had control over their lives.' Women who work for themselves, or work part-time, have a greater sense of autonomy, and suffer less stress.

What much of this seems to be adding up to is that, paradoxically, there are selfish reasons to be altruistic. As Lindsay Chada of life-coaching organisation Quintassential says: 'You have no control over what you're going to get. You can only control what you give.' This is not to say that we need to become doormats (please, not another thing on the To Do list) but it does mean focusing on things outside ourselves.

Over the years, women have unquestionably become more self-absorbed. The historian Joan Jacobs Brumberg has compared the diaries of adolescent girls and found that when girls wrote about self-improvement prior to the First World War, they did so in terms of paying less attention to themselves rather than more. A typical diary entry from 1892 reads: 'Resolved not to talk about myself or feelings. To think before speaking. To work seriously. To be self-restrained in conversation and action. Not to let my thoughts wander. To be dignified. Interest myself in others.'

By 1982, this was a typical teenager: 'I will try to make myself better in any way I possibly can with the help of my budget and my babysitting money. I will lose weight, get new lenses, already got new haircut, good make-up, clothes and accessories.'

To lose weight and get a new haircut is to become a better person; this is a moral project. But we know it hasn't worked. In 1987, a survey of 5,000 15-year-old girls found that an alarming 24 per cent of those in social-class one suffered from mental illness. In 1999, that figure had risen to 38 per cent. The rates of mental illness among work ing-class girls (and all boys) were lower - even though, Oliver James points out, mental illness is normally associated with poverty.

Girls are putting more and more pressure on themselves: to perform better in exams (their GCSE and A-level results have improved significantly over the period) and to be thin. (The girls in the survey were less concerned about being pretty.) Turning inwards hasn't made us any hap pier. We may be on a quest for self-fulfilment, as the self-help books keep reminding us. But the very thing they urge us to do - to look inside - may, ironically, be the worst way to begin.

This helps to explain why religious people consistently report greater levels of happiness than others. Religion offers a glimpse of some thing beyond the self. Meditation also seems to work: one experiment found that, when workers in a company were given an eight-week course in meditation, they went up an average of 20 places on a 0-100 scale of happiness.

The choices we make can never be purified of external influences. The good news is that, as we get older it may be slightly easier to be clear sighted, at least about where those influences are coming from. Susan Quilliam says: 'If a woman has a happy marriage, or has navigated a good divorce, her menopause is over and her children are off her hands, you could argue that she's happier than at any other time in her life. Oddly enough, when she realises she can't pull anyone she wants, she's more at peace.' Some of the pres sure is off.

So what does a happy woman look like? She's probably in a romantic, generous relationship; is surrounded by family she is fond of, or by friends; works part-time or for herself and has plenty of autonomy and control over her time; is involved in the community; has activities or projects outside herself which are consuming and which provide her with a sense of flow; is physically active and has a more or less spiritual sense of something valuable beyond herself.

Contrary to everything we're told by the self- help books, the key to happiness is not to examine your innermost self, to study your soul and think of yourself as a project to be worked on and enhanced. We are most likely to be fulfilled, and so happy, by getting involved in something bigger than ourselves - a campaign, a love affair, family, a garden, writing, art. Happiness, it seems, is losing yourself in something, or someone, else.

What makes us happy?

Lionel Shriver
Novelist, 49

What makes you happiest? Men

I don't think there's anything that makes women happy that doesn't make men happy; and I don't think there's a formula for any of us. The process of writing doesn't always make me happy, because it doesn't always work. But writing the last line of a novel and knowing it really does work, oh, that makes me happy!

The first good review for a new book, that works. But that's not just happiness, that's a huge relief: thank God, maybe it isn't an unremitting failure after all. But then the good reviews and the compliments get more and more like crack. A quick high that fizzles. I'd rather play tennis. I'm mediocre at tennis, but that of course gives me latitude to get better. So a good review is nice, but I'm very partial to a down-the-line slice, too.

Having said which, winning the Orange Prize [in 2005 for her novel, We Need To Talk About Kevin] was the highlight of my life. It was a moment of achievement that I completely inhabited. That's rare for me. But I know that if I ever win another award, it will not be so good.

Generally, I find striving to be energising. I appreciate now that it's the stages before you get what you want that are the most enjoyable. Achievement is very empty. And aside from my home, I do not derive any pleasure from the material. But I need a man to be happy. [Shriver has been married for three years.] More than anything. I think that the urge to mate - and I don't just mean that in a sexual way, I mean for companionship - is second to nothing. Yes, it's stronger than the drive to pro-create. If that were so strong, there would be no market for birth control, would there?

I'm often represented in the press as someone who's a little bit hard, but I'm not. I need someone else. I don't think you should fight that. It's pointless to resist. So those people who resign themselves to being without it... they shouldn't. It's the nature of the species. There's no substitute for having a love in your life.

Oona King
Politician, 38

What makes you happiest? Power

Although 'power' is such a male term. I prefer 'influence'. Changing things makes me happy, as long as it's positive change that I'm making, of course. Work has made me very happy, but also very unhappy, often in the course of the same day. When people come up to me and say 'you've changed my life', that makes me happy. But then of course, someone will come up to me and say 'I want to murder you'. It's a schizophrenic state.

I've wanted to be an MP since I was five. I was a maladjusted five-year old. My mum was very fair, with a very strong sense of social justice. She was a teacher. I'd hear her say: 'Politicians aren't doing their jobs properly!' and I'd think: 'I'll do it properly!' Politics is very exciting, but it got to the point where any more excitement would have killed me. I was working a 14 to 18-hour day, and lack of sleep makes me very unhappy. Sleep is healing - literally, healing. My constituents made the choice for me when the vote went against me, and I'll be eternally grateful to them for that.

Emily Dubberley
Sexpert and author, 32

What makes you happiest? Sex

For chemical reasons - for the serotonin, the oxytocin - for the fun of it. I think when you are literally as close as you can be to another person, there is something incredibly honest about it. Sex should be bonding.

Bad sex is pretty depressing of course, but also pretty rare. If you have the confidence to stop halfway through and say: this isn't working for me, let's leave it. Although I think you can tell if you're going to have good sex or not, at a kiss.

I was celibate for six months. Five men in a row had asked me if I'd have a threesome by my third date with each of them, so I thought I'd give sex a rest. That's the problem with being a 'sexpert'. People expect certain things. I'm a big fan of vanilla sex - straightforward sex, missionary style, with one person. And of course, not having sex because you choose not to, is as empowering as doing it on your own terms. Good sex is tied into love. The best sex I've had happened when I was in love. Which is not to say that I haven't had a lot of fun when I haven't been in love. Sex with trust, respect and affection will do. Love's an extra.
www.cliterati.co.uk

Lesley Garner
Writer, late 50s

What makes you happiest? Friends

I love my friends. I'm an only child, so I feel that I've created a large family of my own choosing with them, and I really appreciate them. Every other relationship you have is problematic, because it's more intense. Children - and I have two - and lovers do make you happy, but they also cause incredible anxiety. Friends are just ... easier. I've never been one for drama in friendship.

I don't like to fall out with people. I'm wary of people who say: 'She was my best friend, but we don't speak any more ...' That seems terribly unnecessary. I had a book launch recently and I realised that I had friends from every era of my life there. I think it's very important to have different friends of different ages. And also, your friends shouldn't have the same point of view as you. They shouldn't be exactly like you.

Doing things with other people makes you happy. Writing leaves you too much in your own head. But singing in a choir - being part of something that's bigger than you - that takes you out of your egotistical self. It certainly makes me happy. When I think of the things I've bought over the years, only art and furniture have made me happy on an enduring basis. I find that I have fewer and fewer things as I've got older. I've also learned that happiness should not be dependent on things happening in the future, on getting an amazing job, on meeting Mr Right, on owning a house in the country ... Happiness should be in the moment.

· Everything I've Ever Done That Worked, £7.99, and Everything I've Ever Learnt About Love, £10, both by Lesley Garner are published by Hay House

Edith Bowman
Radio 1 presenter, 31

What makes you happiest? My family

Specifically, my nephew Kerr, who is three. You hear people talk about the connection they have with blood relatives, but really, the bond I have with him is ridiculous. I'd die for him in a millisecond. He lives in Scotland, but I have to get my fix of him as often as possible. I go up there, straightaway I'm like: Can I have him? Now? It was immediate for me, the first time I saw him, I fell in love with him. It was like a wave of emotion. But as he gets older, and that relationship has developed, it's got stronger.

We all met in Dundee when Radio One did the Big Weekend festival, and I'd been working so I'd hardly seen him all day; but I found him asleep on my brother backstage, picked him up, and carried him round. People were saying: Is he yours? After about 10 minutes, he woke up, and looked up at me, and I looked down at him, and it was like: 'Oh! Hello!'

· Edith Bowman co-presents a Radio One show with Colin Murray from 1pm every weekday

Lisa Snowdon
TV presenter, 34

What makes you happiest? Shopping

Love shopping. Love it. I've been shopping online like a freak. Net-a-Porter, My-Wardrobe, Coco Ribbon, those are the best websites ... And it's like a little present to myself, pretty much every day at the moment. A good day for me is, I wake up, the sun's shining, ding dong: it's the man from DHL with a nice little package! I love textures, I love fabrics, and buying things online gives me the same thrill, the same fix as actual shopping does. Plus I feel less guilty about buying online. My work makes me happy, too. I always loved modelling. I was never one of those: Oh! This isn't stimulating my brain! How awful! type of models. Because come on, what is there not to love? The travel? Wearing fab clothes in front of a camera and looking really good? Really? I was one of those gobby models, always had an idea about a shot, so my big mouth led me to TV, which I really love doing. TV really makes me happy. I'm happy on my own, too. That always surprises people because I'm so social. But a Sunday on my own, pottering about, listening to music ... I'm very good on my own. Very good.

· This summer, Lisa Snowdon will present Living TV's Britain's Next Top Model

Jasmine Guinness
Model, 29

What makes you happiest? Children

Children - and my family as a whole - is something I've always wanted. I was one of those kids who loved babies, and I grew up in an environment that was very pro-family, so it was only ever a matter of time. Now I have Elwood, who is four-and-a-half, and Otis, who is nine months old, and I'm much more tired than I was before I had them, and I have 10 times more things to do, but you can't resent it. They can scream for hours and hours and it's so exhausting, but then they smile and it's fine. It's your child. Of course it's fine. Elwood has got to the point where he's deciding what he wants to be. He's narrowed it down to 'jockey' or 'Darth Vader'. I don't think he'll ever be the leader of the Sith, so I take him racing. He only really likes jump racing, because people fall off. He likes a bet.

I asked my fiancé Gawain [Rainey, whom she will marry this month] when he first felt broody, and he said it was when he was 21, which I thought was incredibly sweet. He wants four children - but I'm not sure. Not yet.

· Jasmine Guinness is the face of Sandown Races

posted June 28, 2006 09:38 PM              

why do you find this article shocking? Yeah I can relate to some of the stuff in this article.

posted June 28, 2006 10:49 PM            

And I completely disagree with this

quote:

---

Implicit in all these come-ons is the idea that, if you can only strip out all the social conditioning, the clamour of friends, mothers, in-laws, bosses, partners, the media and everyone else, you will uncover a kind of ur-self with clear ideas of what makes you happy.

Unfortunately, it isn't quite that simple, or not unless your ur-self wants to live in a cave and never speak to anyone again.

---

That is a hopeless lie, at least for me. It isn't about becoming some kind of hermit to be "authentic" ...
I haven't found it hard to listen to that voice inside my head when it tells me something is or isn't right for me since I was in middle school. So people talk. So what? Their words don't make me who I am.
I just don't get that women are, apparantly, stuck in this hellish world where they have to be things or have things or say things or want things just because X person or people or outlet say so.
Does not compute.
I have 3 girlfriends who are as close to me as it gets ... and I don't see this alarming "trend" with them, either.
I don't know.
Reading that article just kind of freaked me out. I can't believe that women really feel that way or live that way or think that way.

I suppose it's possible.

I guess it goes back to some messed up notion of "feminism". Women had to fight for equal *rights* so now it seems that being equal means being the same ... and it is most definitely NOT the same. I don't need blank just because the majority of men have blank. And other women who have blank are not better than me for having blank, whatever their reasons are. And I'm no better for not having blank, either.
I don't need to have a high-powered career to be equal. I don't need anything at all to be equal. All men are created equal and it is implicit, at least to me, that all women are, too. Potentiality is a different story. But that is based on what you want to do with your life and what makes you happy ... or it should be anyway.
Good grief, it's all just Ego. You make separations/distinctions/comparisons/contrasts between yourself and other people to make yourself feel better because you aren't happy. So BE happy. It's not something to strive for, something to work at. Just be happy right now, sitting in front of your computer, reading this. Take a deep breath and realize that who you are is the awareness that is aware that you are breathing and NOT that stream of constant thoughts that most people think of as "I".

And frankly, men have been in charge of things for a long time. It seems to me, from the way this article put it, that a lot of women are trying to be "like men" in order to feel fulfilled. That is, do things and have things and "be" things that have been traditionally male dominated things. Which makes no sense to me.
Simple example. Being emotional has long been frowned upon. I've seen a trend in the media to portray "strong" females as ones who are ruled by their intellect instead of being "weak" and allowing their feelings to play a part. But who decided that emotions were negative and weak? Oh yeah ... generations upon generations upon generations of MEN. Why should I give a darn about what they think? Emotions exist for a reason, even if a long line of males haven't been able to figure it out. So how can women "become equal" if we deny things that are natural to us in order to be more like men? I don't see myself being of equal worth because I deny myself the right to be who I am, even if those things are traditionally feminine things. If I want to laugh or cry or yell or smile then I will. It's not that hard. I strive for a balance between my intellect and my emotions, not because X person says so but because it is what feels right for me, to me.
Or how about having children? If a woman *wants* to have children ... WHY should she have to choose between her personal aspirations and her children? WHY? Why isn't it "okay" for her to have kids, raise them, and then embark upon her career? Or why can't she have a career and her kids and work from home? Or why can't the work environment be changed so women can go to work and take their children with them? Because it's never been done? Who cares? How is it legal for someone to say that I can't work at a job I love unless I abandon my child to the hands of a stranger who will raise him for at least 1/3 of his day and teach him and set an example for him of how to be? How is that NOT wrong? I'm flabbergasted that women make that choice everyday. In a recent issue of Parents magazine I read a "plan" to get back to work after 6 weeks maternity leave and how to "cope" with having to leave your baby with strangers and the support groups and it's okay and blah blah blah. ????? How is that supposed to be okay? If it's breaking your heart, it's for a reason. To Hades with the way things are done because men have always done them that way.
Talk about equality. Children are treated like incontinent pets by the business world and mothers are supposed to bow down and put them away to get on with "important matters"? Excuse my french, but F that.

/rant off

But yeah, I don't get it. Other people's cr@p hasn't been swallowed by my subconcious and taken over my life. And I don't think all women have to succumb to that fate, either. It might be hard and I'm sure it takes courage if you've felt/thought that way for a long time, but it is possible. And that is something you definitely deserve and that will let you be happy.

*note* Read "A New Earth" by Eckhart Tolle and "Primal Mothering in a Modern World" by Hygiea Halfmoon.

posted June 29, 2006 12:01 AM              

I can understand what you mean when you say you dont care what other people think of you. I often say that too, but to my surprise, sometimes no matter how hard I try to separate myself from a situation to look at things objectively, there are times I do care what othere people think.

Anyhoo, that's not what I took away from the article and Im not going to argue against your point, because I agree with it.

I guess the simplest generalization I can make is that all women are different. You on one hand seem to have your life pretty much planned out, you know what you're doing, know what you want, and are content with the way things are in your life.

Material things...could we lump them into two categories: the essentials, and the luxuries or extraneous? There are a lot of people in denial about their dependence on the luxuries/extraneous things, or they just dont realize it. It did make me realize some things about some of my random shopping sprees I have every so often, buying things that I dont really need.

You seem to have a lot of confidence in yourself and body image, no matter what shape you're in...that's wonderful! But I think the reality is most people regardless of whether they're male or female do care about their body image, and how they look to others. And when their not taking good care of their body there usually not feeling to good about it either.

Yeah I dont necessarily agree with that quote you posted. It's also difficult to be yourself if you dont have the experiences of being with all those people, and the society around you.

I think with the way society is set up, it's kind of difficult for some women (and depending in what community, society you live in) to feel, live or think the ways that the author implied.

Agree that equal rights doesn't mean the same. But I do think competition drives people alot of times. I know thats how I work at times.

I thought this article was trying to recognize and address ego, not promote it?

Sometimes it's just not that easy to BE happy. Some people are just never satisfied...and it's not always about materialistic things like who makes more, who has a better job, or who can eat the least amount of calories in a week.

There are women who are trying to be "like men". But then again there are many women who are forced into taking the role of the man...having a career either because their husbands income isnt enough to sustain the cost of living nowadays or they are sans husband, a singe parent trying to raise a family at the same time.

That's a good example with the way being emotional is viewed. Nothing wrong with being emotional...the balance between emotion and intellect is the key.

You raise some great points and questions...particularly "why can't the work environment be changed so women can go to work and take their children with them?" I hear you on this point...it looks like to me, in many cases women dont push hard enough for this right.

I have a cousin who just adopted a foreign infant and decided to go back to work after 6 months. It suprises me too. She's a pharmacist, yet her husband is a damn cardiologist, so there really isnt a reason. She insists that it's to keep her autonomy and not be dependent on her husband...even though she's got a new born.

Anyhoo...these are the points that stuck out for me personally...

When I finished off school the first time (this isnt only a female issue, and people of different cultures handle this differently):

"Yet we're not satisfied. It's not so much that we have to make a million choices; more that, having chosen, we are haunted by the possibility that our choices might be wrong."

I was really uncertain about what I wanted to do as a career...after spending so much money and time on an education and not being able to find or land a job related to my field..yuck. And then theres' the relationship/marriage issue...in my culture people get arranged marriages, yes even in canada, but you do get to choose...from among potentials that come knocking at your door. I was not in that mind frame.

"And we're completely strung out and not actually doing anything properly."

And about children...I do have worries, major worries about how my one day children will be raised...I have high expectations (doesnt everybody)...but I worry if work full time because I know I can become completely engulfed in my work at times.

"the more we achieve, the more the horizons of achievement stretch away."
This is another problem. Or is it? I think it could be a good thing...how else can we change and advance things right?

There were a few other things....but Im looo o o s s i n g focus

posted June 29, 2006 09:43 AM            

Don't have much time right now.

But as to the body image thing ... I won't lie and say I never had this idea in my head of what I was "supposed" to look like. I'm just saying that having a baby made me stop thinking that way. If I defined myself by how my body looked or the clothes that looked "good" on it ... I don't know how I would've handled myself after giving birth when my body didn't magically rebound to its previous condition. I can't even imagine the depression and misery I might have endured if I hadn't accepted the changes and made a plan to regain my health, not just my looks. You know?

I realize that a lot of people have trouble feeling happy. But, in my opinion, I think they're looking for happy in all the wrong places. Happiness is more than a feeling. It's a state of being. Transient and/or material things can give you a fleeting sense of happiness. But learning to see a bigger picture in your life can help with that. Ie, yes you got a flat tire and are going to be late for work ... why not be thankful that perhaps you were saved by that flat tire from an awful accident? I know whenever I've tried to force things to go "my way" against all odds the results have been less than good.

I don't know. I suppose it comes down to a basic level of philosophy and one's personal religious beliefs. That sounds horrible but I think it's true. If you haven't found a purpose to your life ... if you can't see something greater than yourself at work in the world ... if you have nothing to love selflessly and revere ... then I don't see how one could BE happy. Because, for me, happiness comes from knowing that this world is transient; that no matter how much I suffer or struggle, it isn't going to last forever. No matter how rich or poor I am, it isn't going to last forever. No matter how ugly or beautiful I may think my body is, it isn't going to last forever. No matter (insert anything here), it isn't going to last forever. Life, in my eyes, is an opportunity to grow and learn and get closer to God/dess. Every moment has it's purpose, every person has a message. We just have to learn to be aware and to be happy in our awareness. There's that old saying that goes something like ... if you want to learn to live, observe the flowers.

I suppose to some it might sound trite and cliched etc, but that's just how I've grown to see things and that's how I live my life.

posted June 29, 2006 09:54 PM              

Im not too shocked at how prevalent this dissatisfied feeling, thinking women have is, although they have many more options available to them than any time in history. There are a lot more things to distract women from how to attain true, authentic happiness.

Have you checked out the self help section at the bookstore or a library...there's no shortage of books there...and they're all the same. And almost everyone's checked out at least one self help book in their life time.

"The self-help books are offering an illusion, because we can't ever entirely strip out the opinions of others."

Or have you turned on the television in the last I don't know how many years...how can you escape it? Its easier for some over others...it shouldnt be so difficult right?

I guess some women are more suspectible to this way of thinking and living...maybe if you're not already preoccupied with being a wife or a mother, or maybe if you live in such a community or your circle of friends are more superficial?

And if you weren't married with child you'd probably have a bit of a different outlook on life. "The German study found that people who married were generally happier than the rest of the population (though there's some debate about whether happy people find it easier to be married)."

And when work preoccupies your life (not to make enough money for that cottage, or dream vacation or whatever, but to get by or pay off your mortgage, bills, loans, pay for your childrens education, etc) it's pretty difficult to focus on other important things in life. Some women can't get out of working long full time hours and then coming home to look after the family. Yeah people dont really have control over their life...and if they think they do, they're certainly living under an illusion.

Religion. The bigger picture, the belief in God, and the impermanence of this life helps alot of people get by. But if you dont have enough time in a day to focus on religion, your spirituality and God, then things can go sour.

And I was going to post this quote yesterday but loo o o o s s t focus....

quote:

---

Contrary to everything we're told by the self- help books, the key to happiness is not to examine your innermost self, to study your soul and think of yourself as a project to be worked on and enhanced. We are most likely to be fulfilled, and so happy, by getting involved in something bigger than ourselves - a campaign, a love affair, family, a garden, writing, art. Happiness, it seems, is losing yourself in something, or someone, else.

---

posted June 29, 2006 11:25 PM              

Maybe the younger women today feel the way the article states but I think on the whole once a woman gets past her teens and twenties her priorities change. I think it is that way for men too. Of course some people never change. But I see it already in my grand daughters at a very young age that they are getting a lot of pressure put on them by the media to be popular, to be beautiful and to be slim. It has been that way for a long time but it seems to be much younger these days that girls start worrying about their weight and their looks.

I made my decision to stay home and raise my children at the time the women's liberation movement had pretty much put a stigma on that. I didn't care. I made my choice based on my own principals and value system. I realized that my choice would mean that I would have less materially but I never felt that life meant whoever has the most toys wins. I have never regretted my choice. When my kids were grown I went back to school and did things I wanted to do. These days on the most part women don't have the option to stay home with their kids. It takes two people working now just to survive and as DayDreamer stated, there are a lot of single moms who have to work. If women are unhappy these days it could be that actually their options are getting fewer and fewer rather than increasing. So I question that part of the article. It may work that way for the upper classes but not for the majority of American women.

As for appearance it took me a lot of years of trial and error and even becoming anorexic at one point in my life to come to the point where I no longer worry about it. I still don't overeat but now I eat what I want instead of living on salads. My husband used to tease me about what I ate saying, " That's not food. That's the food that food eats." I always exercised too but now, frankly, I just don't have that kind of stamina nor the motivation it takes to discipline myself to exercise daily as I used to do. I have nothing against a woman dying her hair for as long as it still looks natural. I just no longer do it. I don't feel the need to as my hair still is not entirely grey. It looks like I have it streaked professionally so why bother going through all the trouble to dye it?

Really, it's more important what we think about ourselves than what others think of us. True beauty comes from within anyway. If you feel beautiful you project that to others. As for what people think of my life style, it is absolutely not important at all to me. I live my life the way I want to live it not the way others think I should live it. I have always felt that way.

I am not estatic but I am pretty much happy with my life. Looking back over the years there is maybe one or two things I would do differently if I had the chance to go back and do it all again. So that's not so bad.

posted June 29, 2006 11:46 PM              

What is there to disagree with really...the author of this article is stating some of the problems that some women are facing today, which may not be representative of other women who are married, with children, women who dont have a demanding full time career or live in a close and family friendly community.

So I guess this article doesnt apply to you guys

posted June 30, 2006 11:13 AM              

and why is it so imp to overanalyze all these things anyways. i was raised in kashmir / pak and my mom was a working woman. even when we were very young and in the USA and my mom had her own medical office (practice) plus hospital rounds and beeper i never felt like she was so busy. she seemed to be always there. and when she wasnt i was just perfect too. people in the western world sometimes are just so preoccupied with how children are supposed to be raised. its that obsession that makes the kids feel like they have been deprived of something when a lot of times they havent. as if we all havent seen rotten kids raised by women who dont work and focus on the home. i never felt that my mom wasnt there for me. i guess it goes back to what linda said about geminis only wanting or needing quality time and the quantity of the time didnt matter. but my scorp sis and libra bro also agree that my mom (leo) was dynamite mom growing up. never any deprivations.

and as far as happiness goes well, its not an ends in and of itself. goals in life are not supposed to be happiness. what are you going to do with your life is more important than how ur going to feel in the end. if some ppl find happiness in masochism or whatever else, does that really have any meaning? i see accomplishment, serious achievements and service to others as more important than any kind of emotion derived from any of these.

posted June 30, 2006 01:58 PM            

******

SecretGardenAgain
Hello. I don't think I understand your idea of how not being happy is good some times. I think that's because I don't define happy as that elusive instant gratification people feel when they get something or do something. Happy is something I can be even in the midst of a "crisis" if I let myself.
I never said all women had to stay home with their kids. I said if women wanted to, they should be able to. I have a few single mom friends and they ALL have told me how they wish they could spend their days with their kids instead of hearing from the daycare workers that little so and so took his first steps or learned how to say doggie or whatever. I'm not saying all women feel that way. But if they do, I don't think there's anything wrong with that.
My mom stayed home with me until I was 3 years old and after that I stayed with my grandmother who also lived with us. So I don't think that I am trying to give my son something I was denied at all. Rather, I'm trying to give him what I did have because it made me happy. My mother and I have a better relationship today than most of my other friends have with their moms. I'm not saying it's just because she cared for me as a child ... but looking back, I can see how important she was to me and how happy and safe I felt with her around. That helped get us through the rough times.
I disagree. I think being happy is quite important in itself. But again, I think one should be able to find happiness in any situation. I don't apply that to anyone but myself, though, so don't think I'm preaching here. What I mean by that is ... I still feel anger or pain or sorrow, but underneath is a sense of peace, of calm, in knowing that everything happens for a reason. So I don't torment myself over things I can't change. I just accept and try to give thanks for what's happening because I have faith that, in some way, everything will work out in a manner better than I could have planned.
I guess that's my religious/spiritual beliefs underlying the way I choose to live my life, but there it is. Some people may feel that it's a deception or an illusion, but I don't. And, again, that's what matters to me.
I know that raising my child, watching him grow up, being there for him and helping him out along the way is a huge task that will more than fill any perceived need to accomplish or achieve or serve others at this point in my life. But I don't do it for those things. I do it because it makes me happy ... I do it out of my love for him and out of my love for me. That doesn't mean I can't do anything else if I want to, it doesn't mean I don't have dreams or other creative aspirations. I just refuse to be pressured into some imaginary timeline that is shoved down our modern day throats in order to achieve some indefinable and unfulfilling sense of "success". I mean, isn't that what the article is saying? Regardless of all the things women can and do have and achieve they're still not satisfied with their lives? And having more things or more objectives or more anything doesn't really seem to be any kind of solution.

To each their own or so it goes.

posted July 01, 2006 02:07 AM              

No one said they were happy all the time. That isn't even realistic. No one is happy all the time. Maybe the word should be content rather than happy. I am content with my life. Happiness is fleeting. Contentment is a general feeling that is there even when we aren't particularly happy.

I've seen a lot of rotten kids whose mothers worked full time and I have seen a lot of rotten kids whose moms stayed home and took care of them. I've seen a lot of good kids growing up in both circumstances too. So it isn't what the mother chooses to do it's what the mother is as a person that matters in bringing up children.

I haven't noticed that the west is any more concerned with being happy than the rest of the world population. Does anyone really want to be to sad? Would seem strange if they did. I think everyone wants to live life as happily as they can. I don't think the west pursues happiness any more or any less than the rest of the world either.

DayDreamer, much of that article is something that all women can relate to. So I think it is helpful to all of us. I just don't agree with all that is said in the article. And I guess that is based on my own experience which is different from the experience others have in life. All I can really base my opinion on is from my own experience as a woman and my own feelings.

posted July 01, 2006 04:23 AM              

Thanks for posting that article, it was interesting to read about a problem and the solutions the author came up with.

I understand where SGA is coming from about accomplishments, and disciplined dedication to reach milestones. These are investments we make in ourselves as people. At times, it is very annoying to listen to negative judgements from people who have never made long-range commitments. So whatever, talk is cheap. Right? There will be always be commentators who clearly show they decided they are not motivated to develop more worldly interests, so be it. Ambition takes real work and it is not paved with constant "happy." Ambition brings out more intriguing and creative qualities on how to live life. It takes a lot to get going in a career lifestyle, but I really like it and I'm happy with this. Many women are. There are always setbacks, what objective most worthwhile to us doesn't have them? The part I am happy about is that I get to make the decision on what I'd like to do. It feels good to be able to say, "I know what I want, and I know how to get it." This is not something ordinary women can say with confidence and the full backing of truth behind it. It takes desire, resilence, motivation and the experiences of learning from failures to get to that point.

posted July 01, 2006 04:26 AM              

Having a career is a major focus in my life...I feel I was born to be a career woman. Without one I would become a real looney tune.

My mother actually was the odd one out in my family. She has always been a housewife (a very difficult job) but has never been mentally and physically healthy. All my aunts on the other hand, had successful careers, and seemed to have happy families...and yes their children turned out alright. Yeah I dont think I should worry too much about how my kids will turn out.

posted July 01, 2006 04:36 AM              

quote:

---

Ambition brings out more intriguing and creative qualities on how to live life. It takes a lot to get going in a career lifestyle, but I really like it and I'm happy with this. Many women are. There are always setbacks, what objective most worthwhile to us doesn't have them? The part I am happy about is that I get to make the decision on what I'd like to do.

---

posted July 01, 2006 04:47 PM              

It's great to hear that you are happy with your decisions. That's what matters first right?

Have you ever watched the tv sitcom "Sex and the City"? The characters are career women who pursue love, sex, and relationships. Not in any order. They go through the same issues the article you posted talks about. Like how character, "Charlotte" makes a decision to quit a job she loved at an art gallery to become a stay at home mom. She loved working AND she also loved the dream of being married and raising children.

Transitions are so hard to make, and the show did a good job depicting what hoops women can go through. The dialog is very honest and frank. I recommend watching the show because you'll see that you're not the only one and that there are lots of women who are thinking about the same things you are; about yourself, about the decisions other women make, and about what other people think. If anything, for additional perspectives. I know it helps me sometimes to hear things aired out. The DVDs are available for rent at Blockbuster. Check it out

posted July 03, 2006 02:46 AM              

yes Ive watched sex and the city. It used to come on tv here and I think reruns still do. But I used to watch it more for its entertainment value with my gf's than for practical advice. Could be because Im a nerd , from another planet or just plain naive

Pixelpixie, Im glad you didnt read the article, because it looks like the consensus was that it was rubbish (I think). Btw theres no way that's a juvenile answer.

posted July 03, 2006 12:19 PM              

And other things that make me happy.....

Orgasms....

Oh yeah and