Reimagining Our Relationships Toward Rebalancing The Domestic Workload with Eve Rodsky

We’re back with another installment of our Being Seen and Heard series, and we think this one is going to strike a nerve with many of you out there who are looking for a better, stronger, fairer, narrative when it comes to the balance of work in your home and toward raising children. Are you the one in your relationship who is handling the lion’s share of the care and feeding of your littles PLUS taking care of their pickups and dropoffs to school, daycare, sports, bathtimes, bedtimes, wiping noses, butts PLUS managing the domestic front of grocery shopping, cleaning, organizing, handling the social calendar, vacations, PLUS working a 40 hour a week job either inside or outside the home? We see you and are asking a question that maybe you ask every day; why are women still, in a day and age where we make up 55.9 percent of the workforce and where 40 percent are the main breadwinner in the home, still responsible for so much when it comes to child rearing and domestic workload? Our guest this week has created a national conversation about greater equality on the home front with a system she created through intense research that helps couples create balance, by understanding that women are doing what she calls almost all of the “invisible labor” in the home, with at least two thirds of them having a job outside the home as well. Eve Rodsky is a Harvard Law School grad with years of training in organizational management When she had her first child (and began to see her identity at her job being stripped away because of it) and then began the dance of balancing her job with all of her duties as a mother (for which she bore the lion’s share of the domestic and child rearing responsibilities, as so many women do) she started to wonder: what would it be like if couples could reimagine their relationships as to how it relates to rebalancing the work it takes to run a home? So began her “Fair Play” system, where she sets couples up for success in relationship and parenting by helping them change the way they think and talk about their home life. 

Jen and Eve discuss: 

• The patriarchal history that has been around for centuries that informs why the imbalance of domestic workload still exists when so many other categories for women have been elevated

• How important it is to invite men into their full power into the home, removing barriers and stereotypes as to what men’s and women’s strengths are there

• Changing the notion that women’s time is somehow less important than men’s–and that the “invisible work” women do is toward guarding the time of men 

• How the overwhelming pace of work, child rearing and home management eventually ends up making us sick and damaging our relationships, and what we can do about it 

BONUS: Eve puts Jen to the test with a question from her Fair Play card deck where we dive deep into Jen’s family values–a question that is illuminating to all of us in understanding each other in relationship. 

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Thought-Provoking Quotes:

“Changing and inviting men into their full power in the home is the only way women are gonna be able to step out into their full power in the world.” - Eve Rodsky

“We've convinced women that their time is sand. It's infinite. Whereas we guard men's time as if it's finite like diamonds.” - Eve Rodsky

“We've become complicit in our own oppression. Because since birth we've been taught that our time is worthless. If you don't believe me, just watch what happens when women enter male professions; salaries automatically come down.” - Eve Rodsky

“As one neuroscientist said to me, you're not a better multitasker. Nobody is good at multitasking. We’ve just convinced women that they're better at wiping asses and doing dishes to pave the way for men's free time, their tenure, and their promotions. We can no longer do that.” - Eve Rodsky

“If you believe that you're supposed to hold all the cards, have a life, work full-time for pay, and be in a dual-ambition household. You're gonna get physically sick.” - Eve Rodsky

“I surveyed a thousand people to ask about their most important practice. People say some religious activity or meditation or exercise. I was not surprised that with over a thousand people surveyed, not one said communication.” - Eve Rodsky

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

Peter Drucker

Robert Waldinger Ted Talk

Fair Play Life Instagram

Fairlifeplay.com

I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy - book recommendation

Tiny Beautiful Things by Cheryl Strayed - book recommendation 

The Kingdom of Prep: The Inside Story of the Rise and (Near) Fall of J. Crew - book recommendation

Guest’s Links:

Eve’s Website

Eve’s Facebook

Eve’s Instagram

Eve’s Twitter

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