I’m extremely entrepreneurial. I’m a business-minded, ambitious and successful woman. From the outside, it would look like I have everything, I have money, I have a house, a car, good friends and good looks! I’m supposed to be the poster woman of the modern feminist world and I’m not allowed to break.

For a very long time, probably my whole life, I have been classifying myself as one of those stereotypical strong understanding women who don’t need a man in their lives to fix things. In fact, I have taken this image to an extent that I started believing that I don’t need any human (man or woman) to fix, I trained myself to do everything, to handle everything, to keep going forward, to never stop, to never fail, to never break, to never wince, to never feel and most important to never cry. 

Being a woman in this man’s world is not easy, you are taught to be a survivor from the moment you are born. You need to learn everything and learn fast, you are not allowed to rest, you are not allowed to be tired because if you slow down, there is always another man to fill the position. Ten slow daughters will never be as valuable as 1 slow son. So, you learn to be independent, you learn to be strong, you learn to say “I can do it” for literally everything. 

Fast forward a few years and you find yourself with a strange energy that says, “If I need to get things done right, I need to do it myself because no one can do it the way I do”. Yes, people will call you arrogant but you are not, you are just doing what you were programmed to do. 

I started my own business almost 15 years ago, it was not easy but I was strong, right, so I kept telling myself, I can do it and I can do it alone. I started hiring a team, some really good people, but I had a tough time delegating work to them. Even when I would delegate work, I would keep monitoring their work like a hawk and sometimes even do it in parallel because I would be confident that my team would mess it up.

I often ask myself, is it worth it? I look around at other women who are so dependent that they cannot even manage a bank account or drive a car. They always have “a guy” doing things for them, could be their father, brother, boyfriend or husband. Their lives seem so simple, they are not independent so they can always call for help. There is no ego, there is no fear, there is no shame, they are allowed to rely on other people, while you are not. It’s unfair, but I can’t complain when I chose this path on my own!

The worst reality hits when you are in a relationship, you want everything to be done your way because in your head you are the best there can be. I used to live alone for a long time when I was working overseas, and there I had to do the cleaning myself. So, I sort of developed a cleaning mania, I cannot tolerate dirt or unorganized things. Now that I’m living with someone, I’m always at him for not washing dishes properly, not folding clothes, not using washing machine on the right cycle, not wearing the right clothes for dinner, not using the right perfume, the list becomes endless when you have set extremely high standards that no one can realistically meet.

But, all this is extremely tiring. It taxes your mind and body. Yesterday, I walked out of a lunch party because one person in the group didn’t pronounce “birthday” correctly and I just couldn’t see myself sitting across for the whole lunch hour and listening to wrong English. I know, don’t judge me, it was really shallow on my part and I know it, but in my head I feel that people need to work on their flaws, I just cannot accept flaws when there is no reason for them to be there in the first place.

So like I was saying, it’s really exhausting to keep being the strong and perfect image of a business magazine coverpage woman, someone who exhibits too much energy. It takes a toll on you, both mentally and physically, and you just keep circling back to, “is it worth it?”. Maybe not, lately I’m realizing that it’s ok to ask for help, it’s ok to say you are tired, it’s ok to rely on others and it’s ok to cry. I think realization is the first step. I’m still figuring out how to take help because I don’t know how to, but I will get there.

This world is filled with vultures and if you show your vulnerabilities, they will devour it and throw you aside but there are some good eagles (king of birds) who would treat you like a queen and pamper you once in a while. Personally, I would like to be held, to feel supported and to feel cared for. I want to still be the strong – independent woman, I have learned so much, I cannot un-learn now, but I would like to be weak and vulnerable sometimes. It would be nice to come home once in a while and have your man say, “you must be tired, let me give you a foot rub to ease the pain of wearing heels the whole day” or when you try and fix a printer and someone says, step aside, I will fix it and you let them do because they can, not because you cannot.