Career women = single women ?

"Here is to the guys who love us, the loosers who lost us,

and the lucky bastards that get to meet us."

S&TC quite

Yesterday I had a business meeting with a very young, smart and pretty Hungarian lady who wanted to introduce me to Budapest and Hungarian culture in general. First we talked about cultural stereotypes both about Croatian's and other similar Mediterranean nations versus Hungarians and their lifestyle, trends and issues young people have today in modern Budapest. One of the things she mentioned as noticeable concerning trend  is that there is many single career 30ish men and women but from what I understood, mostly women, who struggle to find a 'nice, good guy' to be with. 

This was really interesting to me as she was pronouncing it, all of a sudden I became self conscious about and alarmingly aware of my own age while at the same time I was surprised and thought i my head - In New York this is a desirable way to be: young, good looking, financially independent and with a perspective career. 

This made me wonder...should the fact that I have a career and I am not married at the age of 28 be concerning for me? 

It's time to cheer on girls and women who want to sit at the table."

Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook COO

So..later in the evening when I was typing out the draft for this post, as these thoughts kept bothering me asking to be explored, I consulted my boyfriend to see what are his thoughts on this topic. 

         Since I am with him for couple of years now, his opinion didn't surprise me. He said he could only be with a women who is independent from him both emotionally and financially. He doesn't like to depend fully on anyone and doesn't want anyone to depend on him completely. 

On the other hand, my mother, labeled as career women throughout her life who has  managed her career, a successful family life, a garden, and wrote a book at the same time, warns me often (quite aggressively at times) that I still don't have kids, on one hand, but on the other hand, that I shouldn't make career decisions to better accommodate my love relationship as I might regret it later.

All this could make a girl quite confused at times, can't it now? :) 

I would say that it is 'just 21st century' and maybe it will take some more time to even out the playing field for men and women cause even though modern technologies do enable us women to be able to manage career and family efficiently the main barrier is still in our cultures, our heads, our believes and our religions which didn't manage to catch up with realities of modern way of life and very individual needs we all have.

The saddest thing for me is to see powerful women with talent, power and dreams give it all up easily just to meet cultural and societal expectations which leaves many of them tired, unhappy and resentful towards their partners who did continue to work on their careers and follow their personal passions on top of the family life. Or, on the other hand, women who blindly do follow their careers leaving their private life unattended and then being jealous towards those women who did find balance and fulfillment. 

Personally, I still stand to believe that it both, career and love life choices come down to the same, ability to sincerely find a thing that really moves you, inspires you and makes you feel alive. For some it is a baby, for some it is a career and for some it is a family, maybe just a family of you two, you and him or you and her and for some this might very well depend on the stage in life they are in and change with time.