'Experts believe a principal reason for women’s lower ambition is that men are more likely to define their success in terms of work achievement, while for women other factors, such as raising a family play a far bigger role. Also some women may have their ambitions limited by worries about whether they can succeed in a male-dominated workplace and by a greater innate aversion to risk taking.'
This excerpt was taken from the everywoman website: a discussion arising on the back of the government proposal to impose quotas in boardrooms, to increase the female/male ratio in FTSE 350 companies. http://www.everywoman.com/gdp
An article in a recent Psychologies magazine by Anita Chaudhuri expands on this idea of how women can define ambition for themselves; that women today have more scope to reframe what success means.
Psychologies therapist, Jacqui Marson agrees and states:
'Ambition doesn't have to be about money, power and status ALONE- it's not either/or', she says, ' You can have those ambitions and still have the ambition to be contented, to be peaceful, to have balanced time with your family and above all, have the ambition to have a happy life.'
Women today are in a position to be able to put our own female definition to the word ambition and how society views successful women. Instead of trying to unsuccessfully mould our beliefs and daily practice to fit into the current idea of what ambition looks like, we can begin to offer a more balanced perspective. A perspective that allows all parts of a person the ability to flourish and grow. One aspect of a woman's life should not suffer due to the ambitions of another aspect. After all, where is the joy in money and status if creativity or kindness or family-life is squashed to nothing?
Surely it is possible to create this new definition ourselves and show that as an alternative, it can be effective? To create a balance of ambitions between all our parts that allows the WHOLE to flourish!
This is inspiring me to think of areas in my life where perhaps I have the perception of success out of kilter. Do I view being a successful mother as highly as I view being a successful businesswoman? Am I as ambitious for my creativity as I am for my career? And what would my creative ambitions be?
Do you see an imbalance with how you view success in different areas of your life? What would your new ambitions be for those areas? How are you going to let all the parts of you flourish?
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