Hitting "Like" on Leaning In

I’m hitting “like” on Leaning In

The spotlight is on Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook, and her mission to change the balance of power in the United States.  Sandberg’s book “Lean In,” hit the proverbial shelves this week and the media is buzzing.  Is Sandberg the new Gloria Steinem?  Will her message on women and leadership motivate real change? 

Criticism of the book is plenty.  Some point out the contradictions in Sheryl’s story and assert that the inconsistencies make her advice too confusing to be meaningful.  An article on Vogue.com, for example, points out that while Sandberg encourages women to take a seat at the table, raise their hands, and speak up, she later mentions that she enlisted a career coach to train her to speak less. 

Really?  First, when she mentioned the career coach, she was making a very different, and very individual point.  And, so what?  All a few contradictions in someone's personal story reveal to me is that he or she is a human being.  Do any of us live a life without contradictions? If only it were that simple.  

There are also critics who ask how someone like Sandberg – with her privileged socio-economic background, elite Harvard education, and successful, supportive husband – can speak to all womenkind?  Regarding this point I wonder whether that’s what she is really trying to do. Author and historian Stephanie Coontz compares Sandberg’s message to that of Betty Friedan 50 years ago; “She’s talking to a particular audience, but they really need this message.”  This white, middle class, educated, heterosexual, married woman agrees. 

Sheryl Sandberg, I like you.  I like you and I like your book.   “Lean In” moved and motivated me, and oy, did chapter 7, “Don’t Leave Before You Leave,” make me think.  And I really like to do that too.

After graduating from a top law school in 1997, I landed a coveted position at a Park Avenue law firm and moved to New York City.  I hated my job.  That’s an understatement.  I cried daily.  My face broke out in giant red cysts.  I read career self-help books until my head exploded from the multitude of colors I saw in my parachute.  

Just two years into the practice of law, I completely abandoned ship.  In the name of “this is not why I went to law school” and “I want to make a difference,” I took a sixty thousand dollar pay cut, moved out of my apartment and accepted an entry-level position in PR so I could work for an organization whose cause I believed in.  Bad choice?  I don’t believe in them.  And my story ends just fine.  But I share it here because I must admit to this – a big part of what allowed me to take such a leap was that I knew I never wanted to make it to partner.  In fact, I “knew” that within ten years I would want to leave whatever job I was doing to stay home with my children.  And in that case why bother working my way up any lawyerly kind of ladder? 

Was I married at the time?  Did I have children?  Was I spending any time interacting with any children?  No.  No.  And no.  My lifestyle was as child-free as they come.  But after working really hard in law school for three years and engaging in the grueling process of studying for and being admitted to the bar, I made a decision six years before my son was even born with him closely in mind. 

I am not saying I should have stayed at the law firm; that was clearly not a healthy choice.  I ended up liking PR and being good at it.  I also loved and deeply appreciated the seven years I spent staying home full-time with my kids and I continue to enjoy and be thankful for the flexibility that being a consultant allows in my days.  But Sheryl’s point about leaving before we leave really hit home.  No pun intended.  So I’m also thankful for another key point in her book - that today’s career climb takes place on a jungle gym, not a ladder.  Perhaps, after-all, I haven’t yet reached my top.  

Look, like other thought leaders and writers on the subject, Sandberg blames the exodus of highly educated women from the workforce for today’s leadership gap in America.  She blames me.  I’ve read this before, I feel guilty, and I don’t appreciate it.   But when Sandberg proceeds to compare a career to a marathon, I hear her, I get it, and along with my satisfaction with where I am today, I also feel grateful that there are still many years ahead of me to work.

“Imagine that a career is like a marathon – a long, grueling, and ultimately rewarding endeavor.  Now imagine a marathon where both men and women arrive at the starting line equally fit and trained.  The gun goes off.  The men and women run side by side.  The male marathoners are routinely cheered on: “Lookin strong!  On your way!”  But the female runners hear a different message.  “You know you don’t have to do this!” the crowd shouts.  Or “Good start – but you probably won’t want to finish.”  The farther the marathoners run, the louder the cries grow for the men: “Keep going!  You’ve got this!  But the women hear more and more doubts about their efforts.  External voices, and often their own internal voice, repeatedly question their decision to keep running.  The voices can even grow hostile.  As the women struggle to endure the rigors of the race, spectators shout, “Why are you running when your children need you at home?”

I urge you to read Sandberg’s book.  To sit down at the table.  And to speak your truth.  And please invite your friends to join you.  You know which ones.  You can also go online to share your story and learn from others at Leanin.org, or please, feel free to contact me to chat at ebecker@beckerimpact.com. 

Good luck.  You can do it.  I like you.

talking about abortion

We are talking about abortion.  Representative Todd Akin from Missouri made his absurd, infuriating, depressing remarks about “legitimate rape.”  The Republican National Committee released its 2012 platform calling for an amendment to the Constitution and legislation to outlaw abortion.  In all cases. 

We are talking about abortion.  Almost forty years ago, in January 1973, the Supreme Court of the United States decided that a woman’s right to privacy extends to her right to have an abortion up to a certain point in her pregnancy but we are talking about abortion.  Still.  Again.    

It is time for me to share a deeply personal story.

In late August 2007, I was thrilled to be 12 weeks pregnant.  I was happily married and enjoying being at home with my then 18-month old son.  My husband and I very much wanted another child.  Because I was 35 years old, I elected to do a first trimester screen, a relatively new, noninvasive evaluation that combines a maternal blood-screening test with a fetal ultrasound to identify risk for specific chromosomal abnormalities. 

I arrived at the doctor’s office for my screening appointment, signed-in at the desk, and sat down in the waiting room with “Parents” magazine.  Within a few minutes, an ultrasound technician called my name.  I rose, put “Parents” on a table, and followed the technician to a large, cold room where she instructed me to take my clothes off and put on the thin paper robe waiting for me on the examination table. 

The technician gave me a few minutes to undress and then came back into the room.  I lied down on my back, and placed my legs into the stirrups at the end of the table.  The technician lifted my paper robe and inserted an ultrasound wand into my vagina.  The technician looked at her screen.  She looked at me.  “Will you wait here, please,” she said.

I waited.  My heart beat a mile a minute.  Clearly something wasn’t right.  She had only looked at the screen for a few seconds.  A few excruciating minutes later, the technician came back into the room with a man who introduced himself as Dr. L, the head of the high-risk pregnancy department.  Dr. L re-inserted the ultrasound wand into my vagina and took a look at the screen.  Then I felt a hand on my shoulder and heard a compassionate voice, “Evelyn, will you please get dressed and come talk to me in my office.”

“Your baby has what is called an omphalocele,” the kind doctor said.  He went on to explain that an omphalocele is a fetal abnormality where the contents of the abdomen (small and large intestine, stomach and liver) protrude through a hole in the abdominal wall, right where the belly button would be.  Omphalocele occurs in approximately 1 of every 5,000 live births and is associated with a high rate of mortality and severe malformations, such as cardiac anomalies and neural tube defects.  A high percentage of live-born infants with omphaloele have chromosomal abnormalities.    

My baby has a hole?

I crossed my arms over my belly, hugged my baby gently and cried. 

Then I wiped my eyes and asked Dr. L whether he would mind if together we called my husband to explain the situation.  My head was spinning, my belly hurt, and I wasn’t sure at that moment whether I would be able to do more than cry and say “ our baby has a hole in her stomach” when I left that office.  My husband is a pediatric intensive care physician and I wanted to make sure we had full medical knowledge.  I called Larry, and prepared him briefly for the fact that I was going to put him on speaker so Dr. L could deliver some unfortunate news. 

Can you imagine being Larry at that moment?

I left Dr. L’s office and drove straight over to Larry’s.   As soon as Larry closed his office door, I released the floodgates of my grief.  We held each other.  We cried.  Larry talked a little about the babies he’d seen born with omphalocele in the PICU.  I talked about getting home to our son.

Later that evening, I called my rabbi.  He is an insightful, delightful man and he came right over.  We sat in my living room, my rabbi and I, talking about Judaism’s view on abortion.

“If a woman suffers hard labor, the child must be cut up in her womb and brought out one limb at a time, for her life takes precedence over [the fetus’] life.  If the greater part has already come out, it must not be touched, because one life does not supersede another. (Mishnah Ohalot 7:6)”

Judaism has always accepted that life begins at birth, not at conception, and that abortion is permissible, or even mandatory, when the mother’s life is in danger.  When the Conservative movement’s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards addressed abortion in 1983, its conclusion was as follows: “An abortion is justifiable if a continuation of a pregnancy might cause the mother severe physical or psychological harm, or when the fetus is judged by competent medical opinion as severely defective.” 

I had an abortion.  I had an abortion in part because my faith says it is permissible.  I had an abortion in larger part because my husband was on board with my decision.  Mostly, however, I had an abortion because I knew that as much as I might want to be a stronger, “better” person, I would not be able to handle the particular challenges of having a baby with an omphalocele in my life without it adversely affecting my mental health, and, thus, my ability to care properly for my precious son.  I'd suffered from post-partum depression after his birth and had recently recovered.  I’d left my job to stay at home to nurture him, and I was finally feeling like I was doing a decent job.  I did not want to spend the third year of my son’s life in the NICU, in and out of surgeries, or grieving for a dead child.

The vulnerability I feel in sharing my story is overwhelming.  I am terrified of your judgment, or worse, your indifference.  I am pushing past this.  I am sharing because I believe in the power of storytelling and I am hoping that there might be some other average American women out there like me who have their own raw, messy abortion stories to tell. 

Yesterday, Esquire posted a piece on its blog entitled “The Democrats Problem with Abortion,” in which the author states:

No more enabling. No more wishful thinking that the whole icky business would go away so we can all talk about The Economy, or, worse, The Deficit. No more clinging to "rape, incest, and the health of the mother." No more Clintonian caveats about safe, legal, and rare. ("Safe and legal." Full stop.) No more pathetic attempts to reach "common ground," when, at least in our politics, there plainly is no common ground to be reached. (If you want to argue that there is, take it up with Planned Parenthood.) No more, "Well, I respect the beliefs of the other side" goo-goo rhetoric. Just a simple demand that the conservative opposition respect the settled law.

I would like to see the Democratic Party make a national campaign issue out of the fact that this perfectly legal medical procedure is unavailable to women wishing to exercise their legitimate constitutional rights to it in most of the nation.

Amen.

We are talking about abortion and I have a funny feeling that the only way we are ever going to be able to stop talking about abortion is if for the remaining 74 days until the 2012 presidential election, we don't.  Please don’t stop talking about abortion.  If you had an abortion, please tell your story.  If you agree that the decision whether to have an abortion is one to be made between a woman, her family, her doctor, and her god, please say so.  Say it to yourself.  Say it out loud to friends and family.  And please say it with your vote.  

One year later

I promised myself I'd keep blogging for the first year we lived in Denver, Colorado.  I haven't been very good at writing the last several months.  There have been many, many times I've wanted to.  An article about women and work I wanted to comment on.  Something funny and fabulous the kids did that made me want to muse on how lucky I am.  Something annoying or totally maddening the kids did that made me need to explore how the hell I was going to deal.  But I got busy with projects and trying to find work for Becker Impact and well, life just sort of took over.  But today marks a year since we left Columbus, Ohio on August 11, 2011 to head west.

Yep,  a year ago today, Evelyn Becker, Larry Schwartz, and Caleb and Adina Becker-Schwartz waved nervously as the American moving truck filled with our belongings took off, hugged friends and neighbors a little too tightly, and took a long sentimental group look at 2592 Bexley Park Road.  We got settled in our (hybrid) (yes, I feel the need) SUV.  Simultaneous audible deep breaths from the front seat.  A quick nod from me, big smiles and a "we are doing this together and its going to be good" kiss and we started driving towards Denver.

To mark this momentous Becker-Schwartz anniversary, here's a quick review of each family member's current state of being:

Caleb:

*Thrived in 1st grade at Denver Jewish Day School; excited for 2nd grade.
*Loves skiing and living in a ski-obsessed land.  Incessantly, relentlessly talking about which trails he is going to ski this season, asking us which we want to ski, etc. etc.
*Also totally into karate.
*Went away to summer camp for the first time last month.  12 days!
*So excited for pirates & ninja camp at Keystone Science School next week.
*Starting Storm soccer at the end of the month.
*So smart, so intense.  To the right is a list of what Caleb recently wrote about himself.  I agree Caleb, an excellent summary.

Adina:

*Thrived at Hebrew Educational Alliance Preschool last year; very excited to be a "lion" (pre-K).
*Loves hiking and skiing.  Composed an original family song - "We love to hike and ski, we love to hike & ski." Trust me, its fabulous.
*In fact, Adina often sings whatever comes to her throughout the day. In the sweetest voice.  Ever.
*Also totally into art.  Loved art camp this summer.  And if her Jewish mother does say so herself, she is rather good at it.
*So excited to start dance classes in the fall with her pre-school buddies.
*Also starting Storm soccer at the end of the month.
*Smart, sweet, crazy happiest kid I've ever met.

Larry:

*Speaking of happy.  OHMYGOD.  Happiest Larry since I met him in 2003.
*Totally digs his life.
*Anesthesia is enough.
*Enjoying leadership positions in the Jewish community.
*Always planning our next couple or family adventure.
*Wakes up at 5 to go the gym, works all day and (almost) always still comes home with a smile on his face, excited and ready to engage fully with his family.

*Colorado = a loving, sexy, and fun husband.

Me:

Hmmm...

*If you're reading this entry, then you're one of the seven people who've cared enough to read all along (thank you! I love you!) and know that I think Denver = the most amazing combination of outdoor and urban living I could have imagined.  I was scared shitless because of all the moving I did as a kid, worried as always about tainting my children's uber-privileged childhood, but Colorado is without a doubt the second best decision Larry & I ever made as a couple (the first was to get married of course.)

*In spite of my terror at the thought of how one makes new girlfriends at age 40, I have in fact, connected with a number of intelligent, charismatic, sweet, funny women.  Thank you Colorado-born friends for being open to the new girl.  Thank you Denver for being a city full of "new" girls looking for the same life - and friends to share it with - that I am.

Red Rocks, James Taylor concert

*After a seven-year hiatus from an office, I am engaged in some challenging, interesting, paying work.  Work that I can do mostly from home, mostly while my children are at school.  Work that allows me to combine what I care about most - making the world a better place - and what I'm best at - writing and talking.  Work that allows me to well, work, but still answer, "I'm a stay-at-home mom" when asked what I do.  Yes, I'm ridiculously lucky.  And I've worked my heart out.

So, thats it.  The end of this blog.

Thank you for reading.

For sharing this journey.

Now please come visit!


Love,
Evelyn

SATISFACTION

SATISFACTION

I've been settling back into life in Colorado after a fantastic two week visit to Israel.  The main purpose of the trip was to watch my baby brother, who moved there 4 years ago to join the Israeli army, get married.  Based from an apartment in Rehavia, we enjoyed a couple of days of wandering around old and new Jerusalem and a perfect day trip to Masada and Ein Gedi.  An emotional evening in Yad Binyamin and a lovely shabbat in Jerusalem connected my family with that of my new Dutch-born now Israeli sister-in-law.

Next, it was off to my favorite beach in the world, the stunning Herzliyah Pituach.  A day trip up North, highlighted by stops to buy a funky piece of pop art in Tzfat and enjoy dinner in the fabulous Zichron Yaakov, and then back to the beach.  A final day in Jerusalem, taking in all the sights and sounds and having one last delicious tasting meal.  Two long, but ohdeargodthankyou uneventful flights back home.  And now, as the saying goes, its back to reality.

A really nice reality.

I am fast approaching the one year anniversary of living in Denver, Colorado.  Spending two weeks 7,000 miles away in the country where I for so long dreamed of settling provided an excellent opportunity to reflect on the life Larry and I are creating for ourselves and our family here.  We simply couldn't love Colorado more.  The people, the weather, the community, the beauty, the endless number of things to do.  We marvel at the fact that we could spend every weekend for the rest of our lives in a different national or state park, trying a new outdoor adventure, or simply enjoying Denver's museums and restaurants and we wouldn't be able to do it all.  Thats just in Colorado!  We're planning our first road trip to Sante Fe, NM, a five hour drive away, for the fall.  I am proud of our insight and foresight, empowered by our audacity, and very very grateful for our unbelievable luck.

In seemingly unrelated news, the Rolling Stones are celebrating 50 years of being on stage together!  Fifty years.  My favorite Stones quote, in fact, the quote that appears next to my picture on the senior page in my high school year book is - "You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you just might find, you get what you need."

Well damn if that's not totally true.

For a lot of years, I talked about moving to Israel. I love it there.  Again - the people, the weather (really, I like extreme heat) the culture, the outdoor adventure.  And, of course, the history.  Nowhere else compares.  Of course.  But.  Israel isn't what happened for me.  I went back to the University of Maryland after spending a year at Hebrew University instead of finishing my degree in Jerusalem.  After college, I visited Israel, volunteered for the army, played around, but then went back to the states to go to law school.  After law school, I looked into doing an intensive Ulpan and taking the Israeli bar, but I thought it would be easier to move to Manhattan and work at Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle.  Ha!

Etc. etc.  Blah, blah, blah.

Life happened to me.  A really good life.

And along the way, I kept working at getting what I wanted.  I keep working at getting what I want.  Every day.

And I've got exactly what I need.  (ignore that old guy on the cell phone please.  He's got nothing to do with my life.)

See, I told you the Stones' anniversary and my trip to Israel were related.

Enjoy ...

Love, Evelyn

Home is Where the Heart Is

A couple of weeks ago, while eating shabbat dinner, I was telling my hostess how much I am loving everything about Mile High life.  The ridiculously perfect weather.  The laid back but sophisticated culture.  The buzz of activity.  The fit, friendly people.  "Great," she said, but "does Denver felt like home yet?"  I didn't have to think.  No.  Not yet.

And then, just like that, came Friday May 11, 2012.

Very early in the morning on Thursday May 10, I flew to Columbus, Ohio for a work project.  Columbus is where I had lived from February 2006 until this past August, 2011.  A fabulous friend greeted me at the Columbus airport, and we stopped for a quick but lovely coffee catch- up chat before I had to report for work.  The project kept me busy until fairly late into the evening, but I was able to meet up with some of my favorite people for a glass of wine at one of my favorite (old) neighborhood spots before crashing in a friend's guest room.

A very long Friday morning meeting later, a quick drive-by my old house, and I was back on a plane to Denver.

I felt it the minute I got off the plane.  I was home.  Denver, Colorado is my home.

Had I needed to step back in order to move forward?  Was the "Columbus is no longer your home" trigger in my cerebral cortex set off when I slept in a friend's guest room even though just around the corner stood the house where my son took his first steps, and where I brought my newborn daughter from the hospital?  Perhaps there is some mathematical theorem supporting the hypothesis that it takes nine months of living in a new city for it to start to feel like home.

Or, maybe, I don't know, just maybe, I am finally, simply, ready.  100%.  To move on.

PLEASE NOTE DEAR C-BUS FRIENDS THAT THIS DOES NOT MEAN TO FORGET, STOP CHERISHING, &/OR NOT DO EVERYTHING IIN MY POWER TO BUILD AND GROW OUR RELATIONSHIPS FROM A DISTANCE.


I will do all of those things.  And I am moving on.

In her new book "Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake," one of my favorite authors, Anna Quindlen, reflects on her approach towards the age of 60.  At one point, she ponders whether just like there is a resting heart rate, perhaps there is also a resting age rate.  I.e., the age you naturally feel.  And Quindlen writes, "If you woke me from a sound sleep and shouted, “How old are you?” I suspect I’d mutter, “Forty-one.” 


Quindlen then writes ... "And if you woke me up from a sound sleep and shouted, “How’s 60 looking?” I would murmur, “Good. Really good.  Better, in many ways, than 41."


Maybe there's a resting home rate for people who move around a lot.  Not a resting-home as in where I might be living in fifty years or so, but place where I naturally feel like I live.

I suspect that if you woke me from a sound sleep and shouted, "Where are you from?" I would say Newport News, Virginia.  Although its been 27 years since I had an address there, its where I was born, and where I spent the first thirteen years of my life accepted, embraced, and celebrated by a large extended family.

I also suspect that if you woke me from a sound sleep and shouted, "How's your home now?" I would murmur, "Everything I always dreamed of."  And I suspect, hell, I know, that my answer would have nothing to do with location.

Anyone who knows me knows that I don't often quote wisdom from my father.  But he did say something a lot when I was growing up that, well, damn if it didn't turn out to be true.  "Home is where the heart is."

Home is where the heart is.  Where you choose to raise your children.  Love your husband.  Build a community.  Be a friend.  Keep learning.  Keep living.  Grow old.

Hello, Denver, Colorado.  Here I am.

-E

"Old is Wherever You Haven't Gotten to Yet."

"There was a time when I behaved as though I were the center of the universe.  It was a good time, when I was young and eager and terribly insecure and not beholden to anyone else, without responsibility for houses or children or the cleanup after a disaster.  I just like this time better.  I used to wonder what I was going to be when I grew up.  Now I know."

-Anna Quindlen

Passover Impact: The Power of Storytelling

Passover Impact: The Power of Storytelling
Early Spring 2012 … Its been a busy and wonderful couple of weeks.  The weather in Colorado continues to delight and amaze.  Becker Impact is enjoying a rush of new clients and continuing to court other prospects for meaningful and challenging work.  At home, my family and I are excitedly preparing for the celebration of Passover and the arrival of our out-of-town guests.  

The Passover Seder is the most widely observed Jewish ritual around the world.  Why?  My research tells me that many are drawn to the religious aspects of the observance; others to the family and community elements.  Perhaps it is because helping organizations tell their stories is what I do for a living, but I think that it’s the emphasis on story-telling that draws so many into this holiday.

Passover commemorates the emancipation of the Israelites from slavery in Ancient Egypt.  The focal point of the holiday is the Seder, a fifteen-step family-oriented tradition and ritual-packed feast.  At the seder, participants read from a book called a Haggadah, which tells the story of the Exodus from Egypt.

Quick, think of a good story you’ve heard in the last few months, or even years – any story (children’s bedtime story, narrative joke, story in a presentation at work, etc.)

Now think of a couple of good statistics you’ve heard in the last few weeks.

Right?

Stories can have a profound effect on people, and can powerfully affect behavior.  People learn best – and change – from hearing stories that strike a chord within them.  This is because personal stories feel “real,” unlike abstract concepts, statistics or logical arguments.  Stories capture people on an emotional level, creating a deeper, more intimate bond.  Stories are memorable.   And today when we are drowning in information, good stories can cut through the noise.

According to Rabbi Ayelet Cohen, the most revolutionary aspect of the Passover Haggadah is that it’s a collage of many different voices, a collection of stories from the Talmud and a compilation of biblical and liturgical quotations. “The most common misunderstanding is that it’s just the story of the Exodus,” says Cohen, a consultant to Beit Simchat Torah, a gay and lesbian congregation in Manhattan. “One of the most damaging misconceptions in Jewish life is that there is only one version of one story, and that the stories of women’s experiences and those of others who are marginalized because of economics, physical ability, age, sexual orientation, or gender identity are not part of that Jewish story.” TheHaggadah teaches that there isn’t just one story, she says. “That’s the telling we are obligated to continue.” 

I think that the popularity of celebrating Passover, and the meaning found in reading and creating new interpretations of the Haggadah, reveals the revolutionary power of story telling.  Recalling the plight of the Israelites helps us figure out how to most meaningfully experience and best appreciate our freedom today.  It enables us to define and articulate our own stories - as Jews, as citizens, and as individuals.  And it in turn, helps us create and implement a vision for most effectively sharing our stories with others.  

Wishing you a Happy & Meaningful Storytelling Holiday.

-E