A Personal Letter to BreadWinHers

Dear BreadWinHers,

As hardworking and successful career women and mothers, you don’t need me to tell you that you have earned the right to sit at the big table. Your beautiful children glow when they see you (if you don’t have children, your friends and family members do too). They are so creative, courageous and confident. I know for sure they will be successful. To raise such talented children, they must have learned so much from you. 

You may be asking, “Am I giving them enough of my time? Am I being a good mother to them?” Just look at their excitement when they see you and you have your answer. 

You see, as a BreadWinHer, you may feel guilty for the PTAs that you did not participate in, the soccer games you said you’d be at but missed, the terrible cookies you have made, and the dinner you ordered in instead of cooking for them. You were busy working your way up and establishing yourself in a world where you have to earn your seat at the table and then constantly prove you deserve to keep it. More often than not, you also have to sacrifice more and try a hell of a lot harder than your colleague, Joe, to get there. 

Some of this may stem from being brought up in a society where women are expected to be the caregivers, the nurturers, the ones who raise kids and take care of the day to day domestic tasks of our family’s lives. Then, to reinforce this idea, we were praised for our obedience and when we excelled at these tasks.

All of those societal expectations mean that when you do earn that success in your career, you may feel guilt instead of the elation you should feel. Thinking back, what made me who I am today as a BreadWinHer is that I came from a family of BreadWinHers. My mother, my aunt, and my grandma all “wore the pants”. It was the norm for me. No wonder I grew up to become one! It’s the example I had in front of me. But not all of us have this growing up. Maybe you had a different example. Maybe you saw your mom struggling to balance the domestic chores she’s “supposed” to do because she’s the mom and focusing on her career? 

Is that the norm? What is the “norm”, anyways? Who came up with it? To achieve extraordinary things, we cannot be ordinary. This “norm” of excelling at domestic affairs as well as the professional world was likely instilled in us while we grew up. You have passion for what you do excellent and that is creating your business and helping everyone around you level up. Doesn’t that amount to more than just being “normal” and having your sphere of influence just around your own family? 

The good news is we’ve already seen this expectation from society change in our lifetime. “Normal” is what makes you happy. Your happiness leads to happiness for your family. While the struggle is real and all of us, BreadWinHers, experience struggle,it is important to recognize that a lot of the stress from not being what we are expected to be is a product of our upbringing and is deeply ingrained in our mindset. 

If we focus on what makes us happy and what legacy we can create from our successes for our family and others, wouldn’t that be a better use of our mind? Constantly battling internally about whether we are in the “norm” leads to stress and unnecessary unhappiness. Nobody else should be able to tell us that we are unbalanced unless we feel that way ourselves. Everyone has their own version of the norm because we are all unique. 

Life always has a funny way of bringing things around full circle. When you look into your children’s eyes, can you see that through their eyes, through the examples that YOU have provided, that anything is possible? Anything can become the norm. There are no boundaries based on gender. We have broken them. You are the best example of a woman who can do anything they have in their life. It beats all of the “Frozen” and “Tangled” stories out there. You might not have had this example growing up, but they do because of you. 

So while you are beating yourself up for missing that one soccer game (despite the many that you have already attended) due to a work engagement or having to travel for your business, think about the examples you have set for your little ones that will benefit them throughout their whole life. While you are feeling the ‘looks’ from others because you are the BreadWinHer, think about the possibilities you have shown to your little ones. That’s doing something so impactful for them that they will remember more than a soccer game, don’t you think?

Even if you have a loving and supportive family, you can still feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount of things on your plate. And as BreadWinHers, we always want to add more plates. If you are an entrepreneur like me, I’m sure that you are full of ideas and dreams and are constantly pushing to make them a reality. Rome was not built in one day. Take your time. Take on one thing at a time and say no to more things that are a distraction. Setting boundaries helps us avoid drowning in our ideas and allows us to actually focus on making the important ones come to fruition.

With all of the overwhelming demands from others that you’re constantly bombarded by, it is so important to focus on carving out time for you first. It is critical to make time to recharge after a whole week (or months, or years) of go-go-go.  Alone time is important. Down time is important. You are the anchor of your family and your business. If you do not take care of yourself, how will you serve others? Take good care of yourself. It is ok. You deserve it. In various cultures, women are praised for the virtue of sacrifice. Serving others while you become bitter and miserable is not something to be praised. 

How are you going to actually make this happen? Start by planning for and taking one day (yes, a whole 24 hours) off each week. Don’t do anything related to business or work. Focus on things that bring you joy. Having a plan and spending the day leading up to it to plan and protect it is the secret to successfully taking a day off. 

Then, focus on time with your family and friends. Have a family meeting on Sunday to plan out what you can all do together that makes them feel special and will fill up their love tank. Talk about what you’ll do together and separately that week. Create expectations and boundaries as a unit and make sure you actually do those few things they love to do. Then, while you’re doing them, turn off your phone. Remove the distractions that will take away from the experience. Make sure that you are bringing your best self to these experiences because they deserve nothing less than that.

Carve out some alone time alone with your partner. Family time is not the same as couples time. Sometimes your partner may feel hints of resentment based on the roles you have each taken in the relationship (going back to fighting these “norms” from our upbringing),  or equates your work to fun for you, while their work isn’t. Please know that they are also human and battling with their own emotions (likely ones of inadequacy), just like you. They know you appreciate them by providing for the family.  Having common goals and open discussion around this will help you become closer and operate as a unit, instead of two separate parts of the family. 

Lastly, there is always more work and more opportunities to pursue than one person can possibly complete every day. Even a superwoman like you. Focus on the activities that help you generate the most revenue while doing the least amount of work. This is the concept behind creating a flywheel for yourself and your business. Be strategic. 

All of this is a lot. Where do you even start? One change that I have recently made, thanks to my business coach, that has had a tremendous impact on my happiness and feeling of balance is using a framework of focus days, free days, and buffer days  to structure each week of my life. Start with 1 free day: 24 hours of pure blissful “you” time where you don’t do any work (not even listening to a work related podcast or responding to an email). Spend that day doing whatever brings you joy! Then, plan for 1 or 2 focus days where you spend time only on top revenue-driving tasks and activities. Then build buffer days around your focus and free days, where you just simply spend time planning for what you will do on your focus and free days.

This creates a framework to build balance and harmony into your schedule. It will be hard at first. You will feel guilty for taking a whole day for yourself each week. But you’ll find your self-love tank filling up as well instead of constantly running on empty. And then, it will be easier to fill the love tanks of the other important people in your life. I know that from practicing this myself in the last year, I am overall better at what I do day in and day out for my business. Trust me.

Please remember...you are your own person, with your own identity. Please take care of that person and protect that identity. Allow yourself time and space to breathe. It’s ok to be a little selfish and set boundaries for yourself. Only add things to your plate if that will contribute to accelerating your personal fly wheel. Feel proud when you stand your ground and say no. This does not make you a bad person. In fact, it might just make you a better, happier one. And remember - you are not alone.

With love and support from your fellow BreadWinHer,

Elisa Zhang