Have It All

Mark Twain once said that The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why. I've always envied the people that have experienced that pivotal day two; those who were either born with a prodigal talent or had an incredible moment of clarity that set them in the direction of their purpose. 

I wouldn't consider myself a shallow person, but my life's pursuits to date have been interests, not callings. Cliché as it may sound, every time I've been asked what my own passion is, my answer is always Family. Family is my passion, family is what drives me. I have always felt in my gut that I was put on this planet to be a mother, and though it's a long, long (long) way off, I know that somewhere down the road, be it through adoption or otherwise, what I want more than anything is to be able to have a family of my own.

A question facing myself and a majority of modern women is whether or not we can actually 'have it all' i.e. a family and a successful career. For the first time in American history, women represent a majority of the professional workforce in the United States. There are several causes and consequences of this influx of corporate female workers, and though I'm grateful to be a part of a society wherein women can excel, a recent article in the New York Post reported that 43% of college-educated women between the ages of 33 and 46 are child-free. 

Can we do it?

Anne-Marie Slaughter wrote a lengthy op-ed piece for The Atlantic that explains this female conundrum. Slaughter left her dream job in Washington as the first female director of policy planning at the State Department to return home and take a more active role in parenting her 14-year-old son. She argues that the 'have it all' myth fosters harmful societal assumptions that women who leave their jobs are not committed enough, picked the wrong partner, or didn't plan career and family in the proper order. She also claims that the way America's economy and society are structured prevents women from 'having it all at the same time.' 

As a 21-year-old female about to graduate and enter the workforce, starting a family might be near the last thing on my list of priorities, but it's there... and it's important. Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg wrote for TIME that "No matter what any of us has—and how grateful we are for what we have—no one has it all." 

Perhaps it's impossible to have it all, but I can't help but think it's worth a try.