Walking The Tightrope of Feminine Power
Thoughts on my high wire act
When I started flying airplanes professionally, more than 20 years ago, I couldn’t understand why women aviators complained about the way men treated them. In contrast, I found that men were very encouraging of my efforts to advance my flying career. As I was building my hours and experience, men would invite me to fly with them in their airplanes, and some men even helped me get excellent jobs.
Looking back, I see that I was a novelty item, a type of circus performer. I was a rare specimen of the female variety who liked to fly airplanes; an exotic creature not often encountered in the wild and certainly not bred in captivity. As such, things came easily in the beginning. I received opportunities and jobs that might not have come my way had I been one of the faceless hordes of men pursuing a similar goal.
But all that changed when I became a Captain. Once I was no longer in the subservient role of student or Co-pilot, when I was the boss, the criticism came hard and fast. Others suddenly felt free to treat me as though I did not deserve my position. Rumors spread and made their way back to me. My colleagues theorized that I must have had sex with men to get the promotion. Coworkers and supervisors criticized my flying and leadership skills at every opportunity. No matter how I dealt with a situation, I was in the wrong. One day I was too harsh with people and needed to be nicer; the next I was too much of a pushover and needed to act like more of a leader. No matter how I handled things, it was never quite right. It was disconcerting to go from favored Co-pilot to reviled Captain overnight. I knew that I hadn’t changed, and my skills hadn’t changed, but it was quite clear that people’s expectations of me had changed. I was now walking the tightrope of feminine power.
I’ve been thinking about this lately as my son struggles with how to handle difficult social situations in middle school. I find myself telling him to ignore what others think and say about him and to trust himself. I say their criticism is more a reflection of their personal insecurities than an accurate reflection of anything about him. I remind him that when he is successful, there will always be those who are jealous of his success and make it their personal mission to tear him down. Even as I say these things, I realize that it is almost impossible, and perhaps not even always useful, to completely disregard what others think and the judgments they pass.
As Martin Luther King, Jr. day came and went recently, it brought to mind how deeply we are all affected by the opinions of others. How terrifying it is to hold my head up, ignore the noise of those who actively wish for my failure and, in spite of that, forge ahead with confidence. How challenging it is to summon up the best of myself when others are actively working to tear me down.
There is a famous maxim, attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt; that states no one can make you feel inferior without your consent. I’ve always been a bit troubled by that saying because it seems to put the onus onto the very person who is suffering from the actions, or judgments, of another. It implies that the person passing judgment is faultless and, to me, that never seemed quite right.
I looked up the origins of this idea, and it turns out that’s not actually what Mrs. Roosevelt said. According to Quote Investigator, what she said was in response to a reporter asking for her reaction to one of the Roosevelt administration’s cabinet members being “snubbed.”
Indeed! When I was a freshly minted Captain, I was in a position where I was quite vulnerable to feelings of inferiority. I was in a new role and had a lot to learn. Others sensed my vulnerability, and they pounced on it. But is it because I gave them permission to do so? I most certainly did not. The misquotation would imply that it was my fault if I felt inferior; that I was somehow giving people my consent and therefore it was my shortcoming if I was affected by their judgments and criticisms. This way of thinking would encourage me to hide my vulnerability for fear of tacitly giving my consent to others to knock me down.
Far more helpful is the message in the actual quote. It acknowledges that it is the effort to feel superior that motivates others to criticize. By accepting that it is normal for others to do this, it allows me to show, and not hide, my vulnerability. It encourages me to bring my insecurities out into the open, not to mask them in a vain attempt to appear stronger and more confident than I am. Viewing vulnerability in this way, I am able to acknowledge my weaknesses and invite others to be a part of my success. When others contribute to my success, it builds trust, and to me it is this ability to build trust that is the ultimate goal of self-esteem.
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