I
am inspired less and less of late, to blog – frankly the idea of being
politically correct down right bores me.
Out
of sheer boredom today, I happened to pick up Sheryl Sandberg’s book ‘Lean In’
and simply could not keep it down. An absolute page-turner had me identifying
with her every written word. The times I’ve questioned my right to command more
for myself at work was a recognizable evil. My home life has been at an
absolute equal keel - I am truly married to the most amazing man that exists on
this planet (the wife most definitely knows).
In
short the book empowers women to recognize their authority to question, to
push, to lean in when the going gets tough. Demand’s that the men in their
lives help build an environment where women are not stereo-typed into being
pushy, bossy nor aggressive if they are ambitious and bold enough to ask for a
good work & home life balance.
I
also recognized that I find myself so alone at times as a woman in a leadership
role. It is unfortunately true that you have to prove and justify your decisions much more than a man with equal
capability, ambition and drive. It
is also sadly true that women tend to believe they deserve less powers and a
lower salary than men at par with them and the people around you don’t always
help (gender no bar). I have just read chapter one and I am so inspired that I have decided to dedicate this blog post to someone who had the ‘guts’ to lean in and reach such
heights of success and also publish a book about it. It truly requires courage to open yourself to interpretation and could create a position of vulnerability for the writer, at the same time also help encourage and empower less fortunate women who have as high ambitions as Sheryl has managed to achieve.
I
have in my earlier blogs talked about inspirations and the women who gave me
hope when I had doubts of being good at anything; reading about their lives
made me relate to mine and helped me get strength from their stories.
My
journey so far has been a fortunate one (fortune favours the hard working in my
book) and has reached its mid-point. I do have a good decade and half to go yet
and as Claire Underwood of ‘House of Cards’ would say ‘we have so much to accomplish yet, to be significant’
I
do, however, say one thing to all you young aspirational women at the threshold
of your journey - choose something you enjoy doing and people you enjoy working
with and make a go of it. Focus only on the accomplishment of doing a good job
and everything else that is worthwhile materially will follow. Chase not the
end but become the means of that accomplishment.
It’s
the actual discovery of what would make you happy day after day, that's the
challenge and if you do find that joy - don’t leave it for any thing in the
world.
