Women with the desire and power to make a difference often find themselves caught between work and family. Between being able to do everything, wanting everything and not being able to decide between all the possibilities. The constant drive here is the desire for perfection in all areas of life, as well as control over one’s own life. That sounds like pressure? It is!
A guest contribution by Jasmin Möser
Be slim and healthy. Be sporty, beautiful and styled. Eloquent, authoritative, popular. Well-read, educated, always up to date. Listener, dedicated employee, appreciative boss. The perfect lover. And for heaven’s sake, let’s not forget about work-life balance!
What does it mean to be perfect?
The desire for perfection in all areas of life creates enormous pressure. And, far ahead in the rankings, includes the topic of partnership. If not in the highest place. Of course! After all, a fulfilling partnership should increase the quality of life, share the burden, be a support. The aspect of increased social acceptance when living in orderly private circumstances should not be underestimated either. Because that way, other people can classify you as “normal.” And you yourself also have the confirmation to be just this and to be able to show. The fact that even the search for the perfect partner (what else), can be a search for a needle in a haystack, is no longer a secret. Because of course a power woman only accepts a power man at her side. He should be successful, humorous, courteous, strong, handsome, but also show feelings – and that’s just the short version. Which, by the way, creates just as much pressure for the gentlemen of creation. They have it by no means easier, that should not go unmentioned.
Always keep an eye on the to-do list
If you have found him, the one partner who fits your life as a woman with career and ambitions: Do you then make a checkmark on the imaginary checklist? One less to do on the seemingly endless list of things to accomplish? On to the next point? Far from it. Because the work only starts then. Now there is a new item on the list: Keep the love fresh. No problem? No way. With all the construction sites, we hardly manage to live up to our own expectations of ourselves and to keep our own needs in mind. Let alone that of the partner. Even more so when both are equally under full steam.
Suddenly, at a long-planned dinner at a fancy Italian restaurant, you find yourself discussing who is going to take care of the broken TV connection with all the projects and deadlines. Or who takes down the trash more often. Who again forgot the cat food. Instead of having a proper intellectual conversation as befits normal power woman and power man couples. That’s it for the romance. And you go home feeling like you failed as a lovely woman and instead let the nagging control freak get the upper hand. With perfect lover is then by the way also nothing more.
Work-life balance, yoga or burnout?
Anyone who knows anything about communication knows that, in principle, it’s never about the matter at hand. It’s more the dissatisfaction that breaks through, with the desire for perfection and the urge to want everything, to accept the inevitable: It doesn’t work that way. Serving all areas of life equally cannot work. Emphases shift and some may not be in our nature to begin with. We tend to try to serve them out of convention, like the YOGA-loving jock, instead of lazily shoveling in chocolate ice cream on the couch like we’d rather. It just doesn’t fit the general picture of how to achieve work-life balance.
Often, by the way, the threatened scenario if the work-life balance is not executed correctly is burnout. Paradoxically, most measures for burnout prevention again describe that one should devote oneself to many areas of life in balance and not only to the job. Yet, on closer inspection, it seems more likely to burn out if you try to do just that instead of focusing on a few areas.
There are more important things in life
So what to do? So shouldn’t we do more of a balancing act between all areas of life? Do we have to choose between career and partnership after all, because otherwise we run the risk of burning out? No! But with the only important focus: the place for the love of the people who are part of our lives. In all areas of life. It’s about the people, not the thing. Ignore the dust lint under the sofa and the love handles on your hips. They are a sign that there are more important things in life. Let steam out of the boiler and make room for love. In all that you do. That should be our constant drive. Every day.
The author:
Jasmin Möser alias Svea J. Held was born in 1982 in Eastern Hesse. After several moves during her childhood, she has now been living in the North Hessian city of Kassel since 2003.
After completing a commercial apprenticeship, studying business administration with a focus on marketing, human resources and project/process management, as well as numerous further training courses and engagements as a specialist lecturer, she has been working as an independent management consultant since 2007. Their customers are small and medium-sized companies in growth processes or with specific sales difficulties. For this purpose, she develops positioning, customer contact processes and marketing campaigns as an external project manager. Since 2016, she has mainly appeared as a professional speaker and humorously reports from her many years of consulting experience. Above all, it encourages people to take control of their lives in all areas. “Do instead of complain,” is their credo.
Writing novellas, short stories and the first novel, has been one of her focused interests since 2011. As an author, she is dedicated to the thoughts of interpersonal encounters. Directly, bitingly, ironically but humorously, the dark sides of being together are reflected. The settings and crime scenes are partnership, friendship, family as well as business relationships. The narratives are mostly wrapped in everyday, sometimes in historical, sometimes in criminal framework situations.
Project Egg Timer 2.0 – Why Confident Women No Longer Wait for Chance
The current novel by Svea J. Held: Project Egg Timer 2.0. A book about dating that is certainly out of the ordinary.
On the one hand, you can follow the journey of Lissi Schütz as a humorous novel and laugh heartily at her and her experiments with partner attraction. The idea of approaching the topic of love as a project is a daring and at the same time refreshing idea. On the other hand, “The Flowered Project Book,” which is part of the novel as a kind of workbook, with its 42 practical tips and impulses offers the opportunity to implement some things yourself. “Do instead of complain,” says author Svea J. Held. The book not only entertains, but also motivates to think, reflect and participate. The worst and at the same time the best thing that can happen: You get new perspectives, feel better and are happier!
The somewhat different book for the partner search is in the stationary book trade as well as with
Amazon available:
Reading sample, project book and checklists at www.projekt-eieruhr.de
Online readings from the book on Youtube in the channel Partnersuche-Test.net: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYrWu9e7ugXGwmVSBApUkFg
Online reading part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESMHI55EgK8
Project Egg Timer 2.0 – ‘Why confident women no longer wait for chance’.
Author: Svea J. Held
259 pages 16,95 € (D)
ISBN: 978-3-9815083-5–2
Published by SRC Publishing House
Press Contact / Author Interviews / Visuals:
SRC Unternehmensberatungs- Verlagsgesellschaft mbH
Sven Remmert
Hanns-Lilje-Platz 3
30159 Hanover
Phone 0511 – 763 89 630
Fax: 0511 – 763 89 632
eMail: info@src-solutions.de
www.src-verlag.info
About the author
Kinga Bartczak advises, coaches and writes on female empowerment, new work culture, organizational development, systemic coaching and personal branding. She is also the managing director of UnternehmerRebellen GmbH and publisher of the FemalExperts magazine .
