The Liz Lemon Effect: Can Women Have It All?
"I am woman, hear me roar, in numbers too big to ignore" – Helen Reddy
Liz Lemon, hailed as one of the best female icons on television, bid her audience farewell on Jan. 28, leaving women to question if they can really have it all.
Millions of women tuned in every Thursday to see Lemon, the creative writer and business woman, excel in her profession yet desire to have an equally successful personal life. The identification to Lemon's life is uncanny to so many women who struggle to find balance.
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CEO and President of Concerned Women for America Penny Young Nance ponders if she knows the answer to that question. Nance is a wife, mother, and oversees a large women's advocacy organization, and struggles herself to find a consistent flow in juggling it all.
"I tell young women all the time that you can have it all but not at the same time," says Nance. "I strongly encourage women to find jobs with flexible working schedules. You have to make career choices that will work for you. You have to ask for what you want. Women are great multi-taskers."
When asked how women should attempt to level their lives out, Nance simply stated that women need to be more honest with themselves about what they can and cannot handle. Also, women need to be more supportive of one another, she said.
Deb Bailey, founder of Power Women Magazine, agrees. "I do not think women have overlooked their roles in the family as women can multi-task and do it well. The problem is we don't ask for help and we stay on that set course too long and eventually we crash and burn after so long of time. "
When asked if Christian women have redefined God's definition of success because of their own ambition, Bailey had this to say: "No I do not believe we have redefined God's definition of having it all. God made us this way. He knew as women we would have to cover a lot. I think our biggest hang-up is we do too much at a time. We can't say no to some things and yes to others. If we work smarter and not harder we can balance things out."
Bailey shared that at the end of every day she will think to herself that she has done everything she possibly can. Even if not all check marks on her to-do list are covered, she is still ok, the world still goes on, God will give her grace to cover it, she stated.
Beauty Editor at Cosmo for Latinas, Milly Almodovar-Thompson, had to also wrestle with the issue of being a mother and good worker. "As a woman who has a career, and a family, I have tried and tried to balance my life, but I've learned, it's just not possible and I've come to accept it. I'm not perfect.
Almodovar-Thompson believes that women have not lost sight of the family unit at all. She is a mother, wife, career woman whose life is not 100 percent balanced. However, she sees nothing wrong with women choosing to define themselves, make their own money and then later devote their lives to their family.
Almodovar-Thompson simply encourages women that "If you are happy and you are following God's word, then you are following God's plan for your life."
