Working women and mama's boys

I used to joke earlier that instead of a husband, I need a wife just to have someone who would take care of home while I was away at work. The thought of walking home to Nigella Lawson or Kylie Kwong’s fantastic cooking has always been a somewhat of a fantasy for me. It is a sexist thought, I admit, and despite having positive male role models in my (the one’s who participate in housework to assist their wife), l can’t help but fear the “responsibilities” of a wife that the society expects. Even independent women like me do face guilt brought in by parents, television and society that no matter how much we earn, we are incomplete unless we harassed by thoughts of running a smooth house while juggling career,  clean house, screaming toddlers, fantastic cooking skills and a 30 plus year old husband who is incapable of finding his socks. Being successful continues to mean different things in a man and in a woman’s life.

I have lived away from family for 4 years and I did manage very well when it came to handling housework and bills. I was and still am quite proud at how well I adjusted to a life without servants and I enjoyed every moment of it. So staying alone is never a problem for me; it’s the entire thought of living with a man whose mother did everything for him that repulses me. For those who say, “adjustments and compromises are a part of married life,” I wholly and completely agree with you. The question is how much adjusting and compromising should a woman do?  There’s a joke that I read sometime back that makes a good point here. It goes as this: Guys, to impress an Asian woman, give her equal rights. There is no denying that most of us (I’m addressing Asian women here) would find it difficult to control our tears of joy and, dare I say, gratitude if the man of our life willingly helped us run our household. You know the one who says, “Honey, since you are cooking, let me take care of the laundry/children’s homework/washing the dishes…”

Most of us have grown up seeing our fathers come home from work and mothers rushing with tea and snacks for them. We grew up knowing that fathers are not to be disturbed for the rest of the evening since they had gone to office and had worked hard. Now that women have not just started taking up jobs but also started building careers, we don’t get fooled so easily by excuses of “went to office and hence tired.” Now the scenarios are changing in an average house.

Imagine this, husband and wife come back from work and wife gets busy with a household chore.

Wife:  Hun, could you take care of (insert any household chore)

Husband: but I just got back from work!

Wife: So did I!

Husband: *whimpers* but my mother did this and more all her life.

Wife: She didn’t have a 9 to 5 job like I do.

Husband: *whimpers*

Maybe that is one reason some men don’t like women who work. It means loss of good, warm homemade food, sorting out clothes and bills with the dhobi, being equally responsible in bringing up kids, and weekly trips to the sabzi mandi. For most of these men, the thought of helping the spouse doesn’t occur thanks to their loving mamas who did EVERYTHING for them. Does the current generation of mothers have what it takes to make life easier for the young woman who will share her life with her son?

Re-training your mind for unending possibilities

In any work environment, attitude separates winners from losers. This does not mean that winners move from one to win to another but that when things are going bad, they don’t crumble. They remain positive long enough for times to change in their favor. So, why do positive people always see the sunshine when things are going well and silver lining on the worst days?

According to some studies, it’s just the way our brain works. We have a very strong tendency to see what we want to see and what we expect to see. Do you remember the last time you had to make an important decision, for example, buy a new car? You may have liked a particular model but had to wait till you got your hands on it and in those days, all you noticed is how many cars in the model you liked are on the street. They were in front of you, honking impatiently behind you, overtaking you. They seem to be everywhere! The way we think, determines what we see. The subconscious mind is still often underrated especially in any workplace. This has huge implications when studying our customers, markets, competitors, and other data that influences key business decisions.

When we only see what we want or expect to see, we miss competitive threats because our brain ignores the possibility of danger from that direction. For similar reasons, we miss opportunities because we only see what has worked in the past rather than what could be. We miss major market shifts and changes in customer needs that seem obvious in hindsight but are easily overlooked when focusing on what we already know.

We humans are wired such way that we have a natural affinity for set patterns and make connections (have you noticed face of your deity on your toast lately?). Our brain is constantly filling information gaps. What was/is a very important function for our safety also makes us vulnerable to jump at the first answer/solution that pops to our head rather than take the time to examine all the data. This is especially true in today’s world where we receive more information every day than we have time to assimilate. Important facts are that the brain doesn’t always get it right and it is possible to re-train your mind.

Most people know that yoga and martial arts not just work on the body but on the mind too. They both have the same underlining philosophy, calm the mind. A calm mind is more focused when not panicking at the first appearance of a problem real or imagined. For those who are as impatient as I am, when faced by a dilemma that makes you want to throw your hands in the air and lament, “what can I do?!” ask yourself, “what else can I do to take care of XYZ problem?” This is the most basic brain training. The minute you pose the question differently, your brain opens up and starts to search for other possibilities. It is easy and possible. An example from real life is when I had just started working and I had to send some documents urgently to an author who had no mobile phone and was not attending his landline number either. All I had was his address and when our peon, who had gone to deliver the documents, got confused between two very similar addresses not too close each other, I had to figure out a way. Once I managed to calm my agitated mind, it struck me that taxi and auto drivers are usually familiar with routes and addresses. I phoned the local taxi stand closest to the address (thanks to Google!), I was able to speak to a friendly driver who explained the route and important landmarks, which I was then able to communicate to the peon. The work got done within minutes. Had my colleague been handling the situation, he would have asked the peon to return with the documents (as he was advising me to do) and cribbed about people who don’t attend to their phones.

As for attitude at workplace that I discussed at the beginning of this post, positive people are already tuned to the part of brain that is open to other possibilities. They believe that things will be OK and they often don’t even realize when they have started on a new/unknown road to recovery. Of course, there are situations beyond one’s control but an open and calm mind is listening to every opportunity and is waiting for it to knock.