Why I'm Not A Girl Boss & That's Ok

Back in 2014 the term Girl Boss really blew up and I'm pretty sure every female I knew felt a lot of pressure to become one. Now it's become a totally normal term for a girl who is doing well in her field and I'm all for women doing well in their careers. It's incredible that we're now in a time where for the most part women are encouraged to do that but the term Girl boss makes me feel a little flat and here's why...

BEING A GIRL BOSS MIGHT NOT ALWAYS BE ABOUT WORK

I know when I think about the term Girl boss I immediately think it's just based on your career and it doesn't have to be. You can be a Girl boss in any area of your life if you want to be, even knitting if your heart desires which leads me swiftly on to my next point...

WORK ISN'T NUMBER ONE TO ALL OF US

For a long time the online world was all about the hustle and being exhausted became a badge of honour and if you weren't doing that then you were deemed lazy and not in the real world. Which is absolutely ridiculous to think about now, to some career is everything and that's awesome I applaud anyone for being that passionate about what they're doing and working incredibly hard. But some people don't thrive from that, we all have to work unless you're in a place of privilege which allows you to live freely without any ties to work but the vast majority of us all have to make money. However, not everyone makes career their number one in life and choose to make other things a priority and that's ok. There is no right or wrong way to do things like this and you have to find what fits for you.

WORKING HARD ISN'T THE ONLY THING TO CONSIDER

Much like the online world became somewhat obsessed with hard work and hustle. It also became a large presumption that if you work hard then, of course, you will do well and I totally agree that working hard is important. Nothing is handed to us on a silver platter with an easy 101 guide to do something but hard work doesn't always mean that something will work out. There are so many people who work long tireless hours and even with all that effort it still doesn't work out. It's almost a slap in the face to presume that if something hasn't worked it's because they didn't try hard enough. There are so many factors that come into something going well and hard work is never just the only one.

THE PRESSURE TO DO IT ALL

Whether us females like to admit it or not there is a lot of pressure to do it all. We want to do amazingly well in our chosen career, keep things ticking over at home, have awesome relationships and then manage to do all the other things in life that we enjoy. Our roles have changed so much over the years [for the better I might add] but there are still all the age-old expectations of being a woman and what that entails. It's not easy to break away from those pressures and feel comfortable saying that we can't do it all, we feel lazy or that we're not appreciating the opportunities that we have but I don't think that's true at all. Each of us only has a set amount of time in the day and it's not feasible to do absolutely everything that we want to and it's ok if we can't.

WE ALL FAIL

Failure is something that happens to the vast majority of us and when it does it feels really rough. No matter what it is we fail with it can feel like our entire world is collapsing. And even though it doesn't feel like it at the time sometimes failure can do us the world of good as it can lead us into a different direction that might not have been something that we ever thought about doing unless we failed in the first place. It's not easy and it sucks but it's something that happens and no amount of planning can prepare us for it.

NOT WANTING TO SHARE THE STRUGGLE

For the most part, we're all pretty quick to share what is going well for us and create our own perfectly curated highlight reel through the likes of Instagram. But none of us are obviously that quick to share when things are going wrong, feel incredibly stressful and are just hard. And because none of us is wanting to share the things that are going to wrong for whatever reason it so easily gives the impression that we never encounter a tough time. It's so easy to forget that the online world is always going to be the highlight reel.

ULTIMATELY WE'RE ALL JUST TRYING TO MAKE IT WORK

So, even though I might not feel like a Girl boss in the slightest that doesn't mean I deem myself a total failure. Life isn't as easy as those listicle posts make out and that if you do these 10 simple things then you will automatically become awesome at managing your life. We're all just trying to do the best that we can on a daily basis and sometimes that's really hard and then sometimes it feels like it's going full steam ahead. The balance between work and life is not easy and it changes on a daily basis, maybe it's just the preconceived notion of what a Girlboss is that I can't connect with. So here is to all the girls who are just trying to make it work, whatever they're doing in the circumstances that they're in right now.