Career anxiety: do women view success differently to men? 👩 👨
Is it a freelance thing, or a female thing?
Recently I shared on my Instagram that, surprise surprise, being self-employed isn’t always positive and glamorous and fun, and a lot of the time I worry that I’m not good enough. In the dark recesses of my mind, I am, in fact, mere moments away from losing all my clients because my luck is running out and I certainly didn’t work hard enough to deserve these opportunities; and as it turns out, many, many women feel exactly the same way about their own careers.
The honest answer to the question “do you ever get scared?” is a big fat YES. Of course it’s a yes. I am scared all the time. I’m scared that all of my clients will drop me in one fell swoop; I’m scared that, like Carrie Bradshaw, I’ll get ‘Sad Mac-ed’ and lose everything I’ve ever written; I’m scared that I am not worthy of this success and someone else is about to come along and take it all away from me.
It’s interesting (and deeply concerning) to me that, for the most part, only women resonated with my post. What does this outpouring of collective frustration at the way we view our success as a fluke, a lucky dip that anyone could have picked instead of us, say about how often we continue to devalue women and their contributions in the workplace?
I’m curious to know why we so readily diminish our achievements as luck, circumstance, or being in the ‘right place at the right time.’ Why are we more comfortable putting our careers down to fate, instead of our own tenacity, drive and talent? Maybe it’s a human thing as much as it is a female thing, but in this context, it is overtly obvious that women have a harder time admitting that it was their unique skill and experience that led to a promotion or new client, rather than serendipity.
We can’t seem to get comfortable acknowledging that we are in the driving seat - perhaps it’s simply easier to say that it was always meant to be, rather than admit that we made it so and risk coming across as arrogant or self-important. It’s preferable, more attractive even, to be demure, self-effacing, unwilling to blow one’s own trumpet, rather than loud and proud. You didn’t engineer your success, you merely happened upon it, like finding a surprise fiver in your jeans pocket or nabbing the last table in a packed café.
I think it’s time to start acknowledging and celebrating the fact that we are the masterminds of our lives. We are the ones making the choices that put us on a path, any path, even if it’s the wrong one. All of the decisions I have made up to this point, good or bad, agonisingly difficult or easy peasy lemon squeezy, have moved the needle, pushed me out of my comfort zone, forced me to reevaluate. I wasn’t always acutely aware of it, but I have spent the last twenty years making calculated choices that brought me closer to the career I have now.
In my sliding doors moment, I see my twenty-three year old self, sat up in bed at my parents’ house on a cold early December day, not pressing send on an application for a job that would kickstart my self-confidence and open my eyes to the creativity and community that was sitting right in front of me. In this grey-tinted version of my life, I go back to my corporate job in London. I keep the blinkers on, blissfully unaware of what I’m missing, not unhappy but not content or fulfilled either.
I don’t want to downplay what it took to arrive here, at this moment in my career, any longer. I did the work. I don’t need to prove to the universe or any person that I deserve to be here, because I am here, I’m doing it, and that’s proof enough.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on this in the comments! 👇
Thanks for reading.
Lauren x