Lean in too far and you’ll fall flat on your face. Why Sheryl Sandberg’s got it wrong… Seriously, we’ve got enough on our plates.

Sheryl Sandberg’s got it all wrong. It’s not how hard you work that makes you successful, or even too much of what you know. Everyone knows that. It’s who you know, how attractive you are, how magnetic your personality, where you went to school, that all counts for heaps.  I learned that the hard way. I was a goody two shoes nerdy swot at school, but that didn’t really make me that many friends. I hit every ‘a’ grade, got a first, did everything I was supposed to…except, but the time I’d finished my masters, and a couple of unpaid internships, I was tired of doing the right thing all the time. I had a baby instead. I threw my life away.

Except, I didn’t. I gained perspective, experience, skills, a right hand man, kids who can dress themselves in the morning so I can get to meetings on time – most of my friends  are still in the baby trenches, at the height of their careers. I found a subject to write about – something I’d been searching for for years.

I gave the best years of my life to my kids, and I’m sure as hell glad I’m not doing it into my forties. By the time I was ready to go back to work, I was better placed to negotiate for myself. I had learned not to hit the ground running, to let things  – including myself, go. To stand back and watch the road, to take naps, make time for myself, not to work for peanuts, but not to make money count for everything either – after all, I’d been working for nothing for years – I learned a thing or two about budgeting, cutting corners, seeing the bigger picture. I wouldn’t let a toddler dominate me, so there was no way I was going to take any shit from some jumped up 26 year old with complicated hair and a manager’s badge.

I got a job – it was really scary at first – I’d changed career direction – from journalism to advertising and I didn’t want to start at the bottom. As it happened, I didn’t have to. An old school friend saw my CV and decided to give me a chance – that’s the way you get ahead, in this world. But actually, we’d barely known each other at school. It was empathy that swung it. They’d just had a kid themselves and were willing to overlook the gaps  that having two children by the age of 27 had left in my resume. For the first year back, I worked like stink, still trying to prove a point. But in fact, that just seemed to alienate people – and I know that I’d let off steam, which generally backfired – drinking too much, staying out too late. I learned to take it easier, to do things for myself, to leave on time, to take the weekends off, to spend time with my children. Being kind to myself was more productive in the long run. Having children young taught me that life’s a marathon, not a sprint. Go at things too fast, you burn out. Lean in too far, you fall over.

I’m glad my kids go to a progressive school where they don’t do homework, unlike a lot of their friends whose parents are paying for their education, an investment that child had better capitalise on. I’d hate for them to end up like me: stressed out, competitive, feeling the pressure to achieve:  misspend their youth swatting for exams. They’ve got all the time in the world. And there are more important things in life than having a high flying career. For a start, my house earns more than my daily wage – and I got on the property market early stripping (the other thing I did to rebel against my childhood). There’s more than one way to skin a cat.

But in any case,  I’d take my children being happy over successful any day. And I’m sure they’d rather me the same way. Never have a life you wouldn’t wish on your kids, otherwise you’re simply setting them up for failure and a life of abject misery.

 This blog was written in response to this post from modernmothercraft on mumsnetbloggersnetwork.com on Monday. I originally posted a comment, posted by Juliet – but it wouldn’t link to my blog for some reason, so I wrote this instead. I basically wanted to tell her not to worry. I spent the first five years of my kids worrying about my career. But I (kinda) got there in the end, like the tortoise and the hare.