Telling Women's Lives

Kailen Gore: Confidence Gap Reader Response

There were a few things in this article that stuck out at me that I thought would be interesting to talk about. One of those things, was the part of the article that said how the authors’ “experience of interviewing successful women suggests that the power centers of this nation are zones of female self-doubt” when women are included. We’ve seen other examples of this sentence written and said in class and in other articles, but I think the use of the phrase ‘power centers of this nation’ puts a new spin on the meaning of this sentence by broadening the scope of it. I think that in past articles that we have read, they’ve only focused on women specifically leading in a certain field or subject (i.e. STEM, Physics, Finances). But ‘power centers of this nation’ is not only referring to the women leading within the corporate world, the agricultural world, or the technological world, but those in leadership positions that guide the functions of the country. And when you put things in that perspective, it makes the whole issue of low female confidence, more real and more significant. These are leaders who are making direct and indirect impacts on our lives as well and not only on those who are within their occupational circles.

Another thing that I found interesting in this article, was the apparent binary of competency and self-assurance. The article at one point talked about how the “alpha-male journalists’ were assumed to know more than women journalists because they were “louder and more certain”. I understand the argument the article is trying to make here: Just because men tend to speak up more than women doesn’t mean that they know more than women, and just because women tend to speak up less, doesn’t mean they don’t know more than men. But then, the article asked the questions: “But were they really more competent? Or just more self-assured?” and in my opinion, these questions encourage the idea that men are dumber than they seem and women are smarter than they seem and this blanket statement bothered me (specifically pertaining to the men side of the argument). Yeah some guys are know-it-alls, but there are some people, men and women who just know their stuff and are, or has grown, confident with it. So why down-play the existence of these kinds of people?

The final thing that I wanted to touch on from this article, was the part of it that said “striving to be perfect actually keeps us from getting much of anything done”. Me being an overplanner, I can totally relate to the truth of this statement. Everyday, I plan out everything that I do: what homework to do, when to eat, where to eat, when to do my hair, when to sleep, where to change places in doing my homework. I mean literally down to every detail. And I’ve found that doing all of that just to try to make myself more efficient in getting stuff done, doesn’t actually work. In fact, I usually spend more time planning my day out than I do living it out and when I reflect on that it’s sad but true. Planning is my coping mechanism for stress. As long as I have a plan to get things done, in my mind, everything will get done. But I’m now teaching myself new ways to plan that aren’t excessive so that I can be more effective and have more relaxing moments throughout the day. And the quote above serves as motivation for that.