I think you hit on something important with the false expectations society drills into young people. For instance young people are told they need to go to college in order to find a "fulfilling career". This is deceptive on at least two levels. First, depending upon the nature of the degree it is quite likely they don't actually need to go to college. Second a "fulfilling career", whatever the hell that is, is simply not available for the vast majority of people. What is available to most people is a job. A job is a means to and end. For me the end is supporting my family in relative comfort and security. Most jobs are a grind. That's why they have to pay people to do it. The notion that ones career is an end in and of itself is a lie that has been particularly destructive to young women.
I just saw the other day the founder of Nvidia say if he could go back in time he wouldn't found the company. Too much stress. Interesting to think about.
Indeed. The stress and long hours required to be a top level executive is nothing to sneeze at. One wonders how many people on their death bed say to themselves "I wish I had spent more time in the office...." I suspect it is very few.
I can relate to the girl's misery at how awful your first job out of college is. I think she will learn to adjust her schedule to make it work better and/or find a new job without such a hellish commute.
She could probably shack up with a guy that would enable her to do that or get a job requiring less skill but more convenience. It's so stupid to ask women to work 8 hours a day. We expect women's' commitment to the workforce be the same as men's and wonder why average fertility is less than 2 nationwide.
Commutes are absolutely soul-sucking though and I can sympathize with that. That relates to the larger question of better urban planning and not making everyone dependent on cars/freeways.
I'm WFH, thank God, and I have no intention of going back to commuting.
There are so many solutions but the trade offs are hard to understand, especially when you are starting out. I hate to tell people to live as I don't like the idea of labor mobility at the expense of community, but it's one of the few permanent options for workers long-term. More people are considering it.
And remote work helps a lot. Live where want, work where you want!
I think that the biggest issue is that society and its various factions always tell people, and especially young people, and even more especially young women, that "you should" do a particular thing.
Part of that includes the messaging (which you mentioned) from the more feminist and left-leaning factions of society that women "should" strive to have a successful career, which often results in a lot of tiring work with no real feeling of fulfillment. A career should not be taken up out of a feeling of obligation, but rather out of a desire.
Some women (not as many as men, but not necessarily an insignificant portion either) naturally develop a keen desire to enter some profession. For instance, Dorothy Kilgallen became a reporter because she had a "nose for news" and a burning desire to put it to use. Society didn't have to pressure her into it. Such women shouldn't be pressured out of striving for a career if that's what they genuinely want for themselves, but women who don't feel such a desire likewise shouldn't feel obligated to strive for a career. (The same goes for men as well; there's no shame in not seeking an ambitious career as long as you can support yourself in an honest manner.)
As bad as the feminist pressure to have a career can be, the pressure from people in the other direction (generally Christians and/or right-leaning people) that young women "should" get married as soon as possible and have children is counterproductive as well.
One woman who I have sometimes corresponded with has detailed how the highly natalist Evangelical Christian upbringing which she had left her ill-prepared for life, as it only prepared her for a life as a wife and mother (which it turns out that she was unable to achieve despite striving for). She followed every single bit of advice she was given since childhood on how to find a good husband, and it all failed miserably (even though she is fairly attractive).
She has talked about how, even though she is still a Christian, is against modern feminism, and is a virgin at nearly 50 years old (which one would think would make her well-liked in Christian circles), churchgoing people tend to shun her and treat her as if she doesn't exist due to her lack of being a wife and mother. She has talked about instances in which such people ignored her, yet were kind and caring to women who had children out of wedlock because "at least they are mothers".
She has witnessed other people, including married couples who had no children (at least some due to infertility), likewise treated with contempt because they didn't fit into the narrow mold that such people thought they "should". She has experienced and witnessed this type of behavior as the default at many different churches and in many different Christian communities.
She has also seen young people rush into early marriage because they were conditioned to think they should get married early in order to have as many children as possible, only to discover later that they were poor matches for one another (something that they would have figured out had they not been in such a rush to marry).
She frequently makes the argument that much of modern Christianity has elevated motherhood to the status of an idol as an overresponse to feminism, coming to value human family over the Family of Christ and essentially becoming the "opposite error", to use a C. S. Lewis reference*, of modern feminism.
* "I feel a strong desire to tell you - and I expect you feel a strong desire to tell me - which of these two errors is the worse. That is the devil getting at us. He always sends errors into the world in pairs - pairs of opposites. And he always encourages us to spend a lot of time thinking which is the worse. You see why, of course? He relies on your extra dislike of one error to draw you gradually into the opposite one. But do not let us be fooled. We have to keep our eyes on the goal and go straight through between both errors. We have no other concern than that with either of them." - C. S. Lewis, "Mere Christianity"
While there are some matters that I disagree with her on, I think that she makes some very good points on many matters, and much of what I have witnessed aligns quite a bit with what she has said.
Then of course, there is the common messaging to young people of both sexes that college is a necessary step to becoming successful in life. In reality, other than highly-specialized fields like medicine, law, and engineering, college is usually a waste of time and money these days.
What I see as the most important and pertinent fact is that there is no one size fits all "should" for everyone. Not everyone wants an ambitious career. Not everyone is even capable of achieving one. Not everyone wants and/or are is capable of having children. Some people are even asexuals. Humanity is comprised of many types and sub-types of people with different abilities, needs, and desires. Even if a large majority (say, hypothetically, 70-90% of people or of a subtype such as men or women), are best-served by following a particular path, the remaining percentage and their different needs still matter. A pre-defined path for everyone to follow, no matter which side it comes from, is counterproductive. Some social pressures may be more damaging on average than others, but the lesser opposite of a greater error is still an error.
A brilliant analysis! Breath of fresh air amid the general forced positivity and making work into an idol to worship. I believe the Protestant work ethic is wrongheaded in that way.
Your description fits with my experience as well. I wasn't really disappointed by work-life because I never expected to like the 9-5 grind. But that didn't remove the grind. For the first year or so simply getting competent at the job was a kind of goal in itself, but after I got a solid grasp of it, the grind really hit me hard.
At that point it really became all about setting out a practical, step by step plan for getting out of the grind. It took years, but all of it was made tolerable because the plan existed and I made measurable progress towards my goal.
For women, this doesn't really work, because female goals are generally not fulfilled through work, but through love and relationships, which work only hinders and prohibits.
Oddly enough I got the goal mindset from something Steve Vai talked about once. He said to imagine the arrival point, then work back to the individual steps. Whenever you feel the grind, go back to that image. He said it's not work, that he's never worked a day, because you are achieving your goals.
I think you hit on something important with the false expectations society drills into young people. For instance young people are told they need to go to college in order to find a "fulfilling career". This is deceptive on at least two levels. First, depending upon the nature of the degree it is quite likely they don't actually need to go to college. Second a "fulfilling career", whatever the hell that is, is simply not available for the vast majority of people. What is available to most people is a job. A job is a means to and end. For me the end is supporting my family in relative comfort and security. Most jobs are a grind. That's why they have to pay people to do it. The notion that ones career is an end in and of itself is a lie that has been particularly destructive to young women.
I just saw the other day the founder of Nvidia say if he could go back in time he wouldn't found the company. Too much stress. Interesting to think about.
Indeed. The stress and long hours required to be a top level executive is nothing to sneeze at. One wonders how many people on their death bed say to themselves "I wish I had spent more time in the office...." I suspect it is very few.
I can relate to the girl's misery at how awful your first job out of college is. I think she will learn to adjust her schedule to make it work better and/or find a new job without such a hellish commute.
She could probably shack up with a guy that would enable her to do that or get a job requiring less skill but more convenience. It's so stupid to ask women to work 8 hours a day. We expect women's' commitment to the workforce be the same as men's and wonder why average fertility is less than 2 nationwide.
Commutes are absolutely soul-sucking though and I can sympathize with that. That relates to the larger question of better urban planning and not making everyone dependent on cars/freeways.
I'm WFH, thank God, and I have no intention of going back to commuting.
There are so many solutions but the trade offs are hard to understand, especially when you are starting out. I hate to tell people to live as I don't like the idea of labor mobility at the expense of community, but it's one of the few permanent options for workers long-term. More people are considering it.
And remote work helps a lot. Live where want, work where you want!
I think that the biggest issue is that society and its various factions always tell people, and especially young people, and even more especially young women, that "you should" do a particular thing.
Part of that includes the messaging (which you mentioned) from the more feminist and left-leaning factions of society that women "should" strive to have a successful career, which often results in a lot of tiring work with no real feeling of fulfillment. A career should not be taken up out of a feeling of obligation, but rather out of a desire.
Some women (not as many as men, but not necessarily an insignificant portion either) naturally develop a keen desire to enter some profession. For instance, Dorothy Kilgallen became a reporter because she had a "nose for news" and a burning desire to put it to use. Society didn't have to pressure her into it. Such women shouldn't be pressured out of striving for a career if that's what they genuinely want for themselves, but women who don't feel such a desire likewise shouldn't feel obligated to strive for a career. (The same goes for men as well; there's no shame in not seeking an ambitious career as long as you can support yourself in an honest manner.)
As bad as the feminist pressure to have a career can be, the pressure from people in the other direction (generally Christians and/or right-leaning people) that young women "should" get married as soon as possible and have children is counterproductive as well.
One woman who I have sometimes corresponded with has detailed how the highly natalist Evangelical Christian upbringing which she had left her ill-prepared for life, as it only prepared her for a life as a wife and mother (which it turns out that she was unable to achieve despite striving for). She followed every single bit of advice she was given since childhood on how to find a good husband, and it all failed miserably (even though she is fairly attractive).
She has talked about how, even though she is still a Christian, is against modern feminism, and is a virgin at nearly 50 years old (which one would think would make her well-liked in Christian circles), churchgoing people tend to shun her and treat her as if she doesn't exist due to her lack of being a wife and mother. She has talked about instances in which such people ignored her, yet were kind and caring to women who had children out of wedlock because "at least they are mothers".
She has witnessed other people, including married couples who had no children (at least some due to infertility), likewise treated with contempt because they didn't fit into the narrow mold that such people thought they "should". She has experienced and witnessed this type of behavior as the default at many different churches and in many different Christian communities.
She has also seen young people rush into early marriage because they were conditioned to think they should get married early in order to have as many children as possible, only to discover later that they were poor matches for one another (something that they would have figured out had they not been in such a rush to marry).
She frequently makes the argument that much of modern Christianity has elevated motherhood to the status of an idol as an overresponse to feminism, coming to value human family over the Family of Christ and essentially becoming the "opposite error", to use a C. S. Lewis reference*, of modern feminism.
* "I feel a strong desire to tell you - and I expect you feel a strong desire to tell me - which of these two errors is the worse. That is the devil getting at us. He always sends errors into the world in pairs - pairs of opposites. And he always encourages us to spend a lot of time thinking which is the worse. You see why, of course? He relies on your extra dislike of one error to draw you gradually into the opposite one. But do not let us be fooled. We have to keep our eyes on the goal and go straight through between both errors. We have no other concern than that with either of them." - C. S. Lewis, "Mere Christianity"
While there are some matters that I disagree with her on, I think that she makes some very good points on many matters, and much of what I have witnessed aligns quite a bit with what she has said.
Then of course, there is the common messaging to young people of both sexes that college is a necessary step to becoming successful in life. In reality, other than highly-specialized fields like medicine, law, and engineering, college is usually a waste of time and money these days.
What I see as the most important and pertinent fact is that there is no one size fits all "should" for everyone. Not everyone wants an ambitious career. Not everyone is even capable of achieving one. Not everyone wants and/or are is capable of having children. Some people are even asexuals. Humanity is comprised of many types and sub-types of people with different abilities, needs, and desires. Even if a large majority (say, hypothetically, 70-90% of people or of a subtype such as men or women), are best-served by following a particular path, the remaining percentage and their different needs still matter. A pre-defined path for everyone to follow, no matter which side it comes from, is counterproductive. Some social pressures may be more damaging on average than others, but the lesser opposite of a greater error is still an error.
A brilliant analysis! Breath of fresh air amid the general forced positivity and making work into an idol to worship. I believe the Protestant work ethic is wrongheaded in that way.
Your description fits with my experience as well. I wasn't really disappointed by work-life because I never expected to like the 9-5 grind. But that didn't remove the grind. For the first year or so simply getting competent at the job was a kind of goal in itself, but after I got a solid grasp of it, the grind really hit me hard.
At that point it really became all about setting out a practical, step by step plan for getting out of the grind. It took years, but all of it was made tolerable because the plan existed and I made measurable progress towards my goal.
For women, this doesn't really work, because female goals are generally not fulfilled through work, but through love and relationships, which work only hinders and prohibits.
Oddly enough I got the goal mindset from something Steve Vai talked about once. He said to imagine the arrival point, then work back to the individual steps. Whenever you feel the grind, go back to that image. He said it's not work, that he's never worked a day, because you are achieving your goals.
Goals give the work a higher purpose, even if the work itself doesn't feel inherently purposeful.
It's awful to feel trapped in a dead end. Goals open a way forward.