[00:00:00] Kristin: Welcome everyone to the 100th episode of The Second Chapter podcast. I'm so excited today because I'm joined by not one, not two, but seven… I had to count on the screen, seven of my former guests.
Some audience favourites and some of the people I really, really enjoyed talking to women who have changed their careers and or lives after 35.
They've all had interesting stories you've heard before, but we're doing a little catch up and chatting about some issues. Things that have I. Have happened since we last spoke. So just so you know who's sitting with me today, I will introduce everyone by the title of their podcast episode .
So mm-hmm. I have Louise Pitman, who was from Probation Officer to Womb Alchemist. Taiwo Dayo-Payne, Being Magnificent, The New 5ifty, Melissa Davey from Corporate VP to Filmmaker at 65.
Jennifer Arthurton, This Old Chick Knows Hhit (based on her podcast name, not, not just calling her an old chick). Hannah Mary McKinnon from CEO to suspense novelist, Martina Clark, the Unexpected Life of Activist and Teacher Martina Clark, and from Heartache to Horticulture, Planty Jane, Jane Porter.
So welcome to all of you, and again, thank you for joining me. I would love to hear very briefly what everybody's been up to since we spoke, because some of you I spoke with not all that long ago ago, and some of you, it's been right back to the beginning. So it's in order of who I introduced, I suppose.
Louise, tell me what you've been up to.
[00:01:34] Louise: So hi. What? Hello everyone as well. It's amazing to be in such. Presence of all these women. Since we spoke since our podcast, we did a retreat together. We did, yes. And I have gone on to actually do quite a few collaborate collaboration retreats. So I've teamed up hours.
We called it the menopausal mermaids, didn't we? And you were teaching them to swim? Yes. And I was taking them through some yoga pr
actices and I, it was, it was just so amazing, so enjoyable that I have continued to do quite a few collaborative retreats with different people. So that's been a major change.
I've moved house, which has been the biggest change and I now live quite a rural life. So the way I teach yoga and who I teach yoga to has changed. I've got a new home for my wound massage, so that's changed. But otherwise I'm still continuing to do the same things just in
a different way.
[00:02:29] Kristin: And one of one of your collaborators.
Kate also came on the podcast and talked about her personal training practice that she's taken up past 35. Mm-hmm. She's super fit and has an amazing Instagram page as well. So the podcast has made a lot of interesting connections and that's been really amazing too. Taiwo, do you wanna tell me about what you've been up to?
[00:02:51] Taiwo: Sure. I've continued on with the new 50 that's midlife coaching supporting people to create their next chapter and I continued on with that. I turned 60 last year. And earlier this year I kind. I sort of went back to as well as the, the coaching. I went back to writing fiction and I'm writing a play right now and and I submitted a novel that I've, I'd written years ago into a, a competition for debut novelists over 50.
And I was long listed. I was, was in the top 40 out of like 1700 people. Long listed. Didn't get shortlisted, but I was so happy that I was long listed. And so, and it's been interesting because with the playwriting it's kind of beginning to open some opportunities that I can't really talk about right now.
But it's opened things up and it came at a time that was I was beginning to feel a bit burnt out by the other stuff and so I stepped back and decided to focus on the writing and it's just really energized me to go back to the coaching. The coaching stuff, which was beginning to feel a little bit, a bit heavy.
But yeah, so that's what I've been up to.
[00:04:07] Kristin: Amazing. we definitely have a couple published novelists here, so that might be a connection that you can be, that you can be making today. Melissa, I know you've been the, the, it wasn't a fluke that you became a filmmaker that has continued.
[00:04:21] Melissa: It has, it has.
Well, I finished filming my second film, the first one's called Beyond 60, and it's about women over the age of 60 nine different women, their stories of continued relevance and their great resilience stories. And I filmed my second film last May in Yosemite. And it is a story about a woman who is now 72, and she's the oldest woman to climb El Capitan.
And it just so happens the little twist in her story is that she is the mother of Alex Honnold and Alex Honnold, [00:05:00] if you've ever seen. Documentary.
[00:05:02] Kristin: You can see from my face that I'm quite aware of Alex.
[00:05:04] Melissa: Free solo Alex Honnold, you know, only human that has climbed El Capitan with no assistance, no ropes, no nothing.
So this is the story about his mother. And his mother was not an athlete. She was an intellect, you know, an artist, a musician, a professor, a linguist, a writer. She was everything but an athlete. And her story is about how she found her second wind through her children and she became the oldest woman to climb L Cap.
But she did it with ropes. Of course
[00:05:39] Kristin: I feel like I've seen little teasers, but I had no idea. This is amazing.
[00:05:42] Melissa: Yeah. It, it's, it's a great story and it was so much fun being in Yosemite and I actually, me. I'm now turning 73 this month, and I had to climb the thousand feet up to where she began climbing.
And to me, climbing that thousand feet just to get to the base of the rock was an incredible feat for me. And and it, it spurred me on to come home, join a gym, and get back into making sure that my body's healthy for the next 10 years until I'm 83. So I was gonna say the next 73 years. So that's what I've been doing.
[00:06:22] Kristin: Yeah. Brilliant, brilliant. Jennifer, what have you been up to?
[00:06:27] Jennifer: What have I been up to? I can't even remember how long ago it was that we talked, so I
[00:06:31] Kristin: can't either, but it's been a little while. It's been
[00:06:34] Jennifer: a while. Yes, what I've been up to lots of speaking gigs, which has been so awesome. Just in front of incredible audiences.
So I've been doing a lot of that. The podcast continues to grow. I have been lucky enough to interview Melissa as well as Deirdre, which two incredible interviews. If you've never listened to my podcast, go listen to those two. And and I'm getting into doing well. I'm expanding the old chicks, no shit community.
It's again, growing by leaps and bounds and the reason is because so many women. Have resonated with my story of reinvention, who have found themselves in the corporate world for whatever reason. They can't continue and have reinvented themselves. And so that continues to grow.
And I'm getting more into in-person events. So I just kicked off a new series of events called women Wine and Midlife Wisdom. And so it's about an intimate event getting midlife women around the table to share their insights, to ask questions, to connect with each other, which I am so totally loving.
Midlife women are incredible resources of wisdom, as we all know. But yeah, so it's been, it's been a lot of that, but really feeling called to do more in person after, you know, three years of pandemic.
[00:07:50] Kristin: it seems like I spoke to so many of you when we really weren't getting out of the house and we really weren't, you know, so it is nice to hear everybody going back to doing.
In-person things and a bit more live. Mm-hmm. And, and obviously it's also nice that we can all do this here when some of you're in Canada and the US and, and the uk and, and we don't have to be in the same place, but being in one place is also
[00:08:12] Hannah: nice. So Hannah. Thanks for having me back on. I really appreciate it.
So what have I been up to? I checked and we spoke in 2021. So I guess I've had three thriller novels published since then. And the big change is that I'm also writing holiday romantic comedies which is a very strange way that it came about, you know, going from murdering people, fictional people, obviously, to, to having them fall in love is quite, quite different, and yet very sweet and very lovely.
So that came about because my, well, my mom passed in 2020. She was in Switzerland. I was here and in Canada, and I couldn't get over to see her and. The novel that I wrote the suspense novel I wrote that year. That's my, I've had multiple pandemic releases, but that was the one that I wrote during lockdown, turned out to be my funniest.
It's super dark. It's about a guy who hires a hitman on the dark web to get rid of his very rich, but incredibly annoying wife. And he's very, very funny. And he was funny because I needed somewhere to escape. And as I was doing that, I thought, oh, what, how could I write another romcom? My first book was a romcom.
When would I do that? How would I do that? And so forth. And I did nothing because sometimes inertia is easier. And then my agent contacted me completely out of the blue and said, do you fancy writing a holiday romcom? And I said, yes. And so I have, I've written two. So I have one publishing next month and then another one next year.
The thrill I wrote for next year. Is about the rise and demise of the all female pop rock group called The Bittersweet, completely fictional, and it's written from the drummer's perspective and inspired me at the ripe [00:10:00] old age of 52 to learn how to play the drums. So that's my other project.
Wow. I have not played an instrument since I've played the recorder when I was 10, and I was booted off the school choir because I sucked. So this will be interesting.
[00:10:15] Kristin: You have to listen to the episode about the women who became rock stars. I don't know if you've, if you've encountered that one, but I did speak to some women who became rock stars at 50 something and I think one of them is 60 something.
They are brilliant. I've gone to see them live and it's not just that they're rock stars, they are like garage punk rock.
[00:10:33] Hannah: As long as I don't have to sing, I'm alright because I cannot sing. So as long as I just drop, well would sit the same and
[00:10:38] Kristin: she now sings as well.
So you never know. Yeah, no, that's not gonna happen. Martina, welcome back. It's lovely to see you. Tell me what you've been up
[00:10:46] Martina: to. Thank you so much for having me and like everybody, I'm just honored to be in this room, even if it's a Zoom room. I think in the last seven or eight months since I spoke to you I've pretty much been doing the same stuff, which is teaching.
I'm a college professor. I teach English 1 0 1, and then I teach public speaking. And the public speaking class is actually new this year. But I've been loving it because in my past lives I did a lot of public speaking and it's it's been thrilling to sort of share the skills with these young people and help them understand that they have a voice and how to amplify it, both in terms of shaping their speeches, but also presenting.
I've been trying to do more writing, carving out more time to submit my own writing. With a little bit of success, but I need to do more of that. And then I think the main thing well I've been spending a lot of time also publish promoting my audiobook, which came out in January. Not as much time as I should because you read
[00:11:47] Kristin: you voiced your own audiobook, right?
I
[00:11:48] Martina: did. I narrated it. And yeah, it's just doing all of the publicity, doing all the publicity is like a whole full-time job on top of life. And I sort of feel like I already did that with the book. Now I have to do it with the audiobook, so I'm tired, but it's all good. And then the main thing that's different is we've had our grandson with us for the summer, and he's gonna be with us for the next year.
And I, I sort of award him. TikTok time. If he makes videos about my book for me on
[00:12:23] Hannah: TikTok, on book talk, he's,
[00:12:25] Kristin: that's like the most modern grandma
thing I've ever heard.
[00:12:27] Martina: He's eight. That's awesome. He's very good at it. He understands it, he likes it, it makes him happy and it helps me. So there you go.
[00:12:36] Kristin: love it.
And I didn't say this about Hannah, but I should say Hannah, Mary McKinnon as well, and Martina Clark. Both of their books are really completely different. Or I say books. Hannah has tons of them. But both the books that I've read and Martina's life story is so fascinating. So if you get the chance, you should just definitely check it out.
Last but not least, plan to Jane, Jane Porter, you have been winning all kinds of awards, so please don't be shy about bragging about them. Tell me, tell me what you've been up to.
[00:13:03] Jane: No. Hi. I also thanks so much. It's so fun to be back and chatting about all this stuff. I also had a check. So when we last spoke, it was April 21.
And so a few months after that I graduated from my planting design diploma that I was doing at Q Gardens and I got distinction and I got best project prize for that. So that was great. And then the following May in 22, I did a small garden at Chelsea Flower Show and got a gold medal for it. Nice. And then this year in May, I did my second garden at Chelsea Flower Show and got a silver Guild medal.
So that's, those two gardens have kind of really been my biggest projects and taken over everything I'm doing. And so I suppose the rest of the time I've been doing a lot more things like been invited to do a few talks. I'm still doing my video consultations and I've also started doing a bit of mentoring for people who want to change.
Careers into horticulture. So many people have contacted me after hearing this. Oh, nice. Like the most amazing I don't know, just really amazing feedback. It's just lovely. So that's been great having those conversations with people. And I'm still doing I, I think we talked about it on the podcast, but I'm still doing the talks that I do in art galleries for new parents to give them something interesting to do that they can take their babies to, and it's a bit of sanity.
[00:14:34] Kristin: I made me think of you because I spoke with Matilda Leyser a couple weeks ago and she's just published a novel. But she also is the founder of a group called Mother Sue Make, which she's a theater performer, but she realized there was no space for like, her work life and her creative life and her, her motherhood to intersect.
And so she started creating this space for, you know, [00:15:00] mothers who were, and now it's m slash others. So people who are caregivers who wanna really intersect their careers and their creativity and their, their. Their caregiving responsibilities and be able to bring their kids into the room. And, and, and I thought of you and, and how you'd have the gallery.
[00:15:17] Jane: I think quite often the re the way it sort of fits in with this conversation about career changes because I think after having a child taking time off, a lot of people do reconsider what they're doing. So I like to think that it's sort of it fits in in that way. And we quite often with the groups, we, we have conversations about what people's feelings are about going back to work and if they've wanted to change and what that might be.
So it, it comes into it as well. This same conversation.
[00:15:48] Kristin: I think one of the reasons I asked what everybody's been up to is I think now that we've all made some sort of a shift, you kind of start to realize that careers can be fluid. It doesn't have to be one thing and then another, or it doesn't have to be one thing for life.
And I think obviously we're all big advocates of that. But it is interesting to hear everyone because it seems like everyone kind of has what they've been doing, what we maybe talked about as far as a couple years ago to a few months ago. But then also adding things to it, realising, you know, the strings to our bow.
And one of the things I was asking about before we all got on the call was if there's too much, you know, is there, I know that my mom kind of. Supports the fact that I'm, what would be called multi-hyphenate, do a lot of different things. But she has said things to me like, if you really focused on one thing, do you think that you would be, you know, more successful at it?
Or do you think that, and I don't know if I'd be more successful, I might be less happy. So Melissa, I know you kind of responded to that question can you do too much?
[00:16:54] Melissa: I, I don't
think so. I mean, the older I get, the more I realize that I.
For me anyway, and for most people that I know you have to grab all the potential opportunities that are there in order to grow as an individual. So if I had stayed in my, one of my careers, I mean, I had a few, but the last one, which was a couple decades long as a corporate, you know, Maven, which was really not me, but I played the game well.
If I had just stayed in that I would've missed these opportunities to, to use my creative side. Not that I wasn't creative, but what I found was that everything that I've done since then, or since all of the jobs that I've had, I've taken pieces from each of those experiences to bring to whatever endeavor I'm involved in now, and it makes that more rich and more fulfilling and more exciting.
And it just makes me realize that, you know, you just have to, there's all these ripples that go through life and if you keep riding them, you keep picking up new talents and new tricks and it affords you the opportunity to take the risk and, and try new things. So I don't, I don't think that I would have been better if I had stayed at one job and got, I was already really good at it.
You know, frankly, I think I, I, I did my piece and I did it in a period of time and, and then that was it. And it was time for me to move on. I, I really do feel now at 73 that there are moments in my life and they're coming much more quickly now that it's time for something new. I always get that urge that, okay, I learned this.
What can I take from this and try something new? So I think that that's how we become the most well-rounded person that we can be is when we take those risks and try new things and, and you can be good and great at a lot of little things along the way.
[00:19:00] Kristin: I see a lot of nodding as well. And I'll, I'll ask Taiwo, because you coach a lot of women and people who are, you know, midlife and you have your hero's journey. You obviously are multihyphenate and have kind of come, come back to things that were, things you'd done before.
What do you think about, you know, can we do too much? Is there a need to, to streamline?
[00:19:22] Taiwo: I think it's, to be quite honest, I think it depends on the person and what kind of floats their boat. I mean, I was listening to Melissa and, and I totally agree that, you know you take bits from every part of your life and they kind of, as you, as you get older, it just gets richer and richer that it's the cake.
It's like a cake that has that gets richer and richer with time. But something that I'm. noticing is, for instance, when I stopped acting, for instance, I went into, I started working in mental health and it was as though I was never an actor. It was like I shut that door on that aspect of my life.
And [00:20:00] I realised that as I got older, that I was kind of doing that with, I'm a, I'm a coach, I'm a writer, I'm a local preacher for the Methodist church, but none of them were kind of integrating, I guess the writing was kind of integrating a little bit, but I wasn't consciously doing that. And it was, it, it did feel a lot, it felt like there was too much for a start.
The writing had to go so that I could try and build the coaching business and, and it just was feeling like everything was, I was being spread too thin. But actually it's. I, I kind of looked at it as different facets of myself. So, you know, that I had this, there's this part of me that writes, there's this part of me that coaches, and there's, but they're all me.
And my writing comes into my coaching in, through my marketing, my writing comes in through my my preaching, the spirituality that I use in that spans everything else. And so I've started fi finding in the last couple of years, I've been finding ways of integrating them all. And the final bit was, I suppose the fiction aspect was that I, I, I, I left that out there.
But once I started doing that, it kind of, it was almost like it was a piece of a jigsaw that needed to come in to start making me be more in flow. So yes, you can have you can have lots of different things happening, but I. I think that it's, it's important to recognize the different threads that, and the things that link them so that they're not so different, but that you can incorporate each of them and understand that, that this part of you comes out in this context and this part of you comes out in that context.
And it's not one or the other, it's just you in the same way that you guys are going to see, see this part of me, but then I will go and talk to somebody that knows me really well and they'll see a different part of me. But, but that doesn't mean it's two separate things and
exactly. So so I think that it, that is, it is possible to have, for it to be too much if you are not managing it well. And not everybody needs to be, have lots of things. There are some people that really work really well with being focused on the one thing. Mm-hmm. Or a couple of things. But, and, and I think that those of us that, that are, that do thrive on having fingers in lots of pies, we are quite lucky now because I think in yesterday years it would've been harder for us to, to do that.
And we would've had to wait until all the kids had gone left home or all the obligations when, or we were retired and we're too tired and all that kind of stuff. But now, you know, it certainly for me, I just find that by integrating it, everything, I'm actually more energised because one thing feeds.
Mm-hmm. My soul and gives me the, the energy to, to focus on the next bit.
[00:22:58] Kristin: That makes a lot of sense. 'cause I do feel like sometimes it's too much and I'm just like, okay, I like the multi hyphens, but maybe, maybe I need to figure out a way to make them work together. Yeah. Jennifer, you look like you're gonna say something.
[00:23:08] Jennifer: I, I was just gonna say, I think too much as well comes from so agree with, with everything that was just said, but I think the too much comes from The reason why we're doing the things that we're doing. Like, are we truly doing them because they're part of who we are? Mm-hmm. And they're part of our expression?
Or are we doing them because it's on the list of things I should be doing. Right. Because as women, as people in general, but especially as women, like we are handed the script with how to be, how to show up, what to do. And I did this for most of my life, was follow the script. Right.
And that meant cutting off parts of who I was and not doing things that I was truly passionate about because it wasn't on that list of things to do. And I truly believe that our job is to explore all the parts of us. And when we're confined by the box or by the title or by the to-do list, right. We're we can't.
Mm-hmm. And so then when we try to add on these other parts of ourselves while we're still doing all that stuff, yeah, it can feel like a lot. But I know personally, I feel like my capacity has expanded. Mm-hmm. Multi times over to be able to do num numerous different things and, and honor different parts of myself all at the same time.
Whereas I never, I mean, I, I ended up in pretty severe burnout, right? Mm-hmm. From just living my corporate life. And now that I'm doing things that are really honouring parts of myself, it feels like my capacity for, for doing all the things. It's just like expanded in ways that I couldn't have imagined.
[00:24:37] Hannah: I'd like to add that I'm a self-confessed workaholic. Always was, always have been. And I have a very different relationship with my husband in terms of, of the traditional relationship.
So he, he was a stay at home dad for seven years. 'cause I had this big corporate job. He said, I'll stay at home with, with the baby, no problem. This is even before I got [00:25:00] pregnant. And he was at home for the first seven years. We had three kids in 16 months. 'cause we had twins the second time around.
So it's a very different experience. I had the, the more traditional male role in terms of being the sole breadwinner with my husband being, being a stay-at-home dad all that to, to kind of frame what I'm about to say, because I'm a self-confessed workaholic. That is something that I am working to change because I do think that you can do too much and particularly when you change your career.
You are doing everything you can and saying yes to everything, because why wouldn't you? You want your second career, your change to be successful. That's why you changed. So I said yes to absolutely everything, any opportunity that came my way. In terms of the writing, in terms of, of promotion, Martina, you were saying that it's a, a full-time gig to promote an audiobook.
I'm, I'm published traditionally so with, with big publishers, but it's still a lot on the side to, to make, to add to the noise that's being made about the book. So I would say yes to every single thing. And this year my son's girlfriend died in a car crash and my dad, a couple of months later was diagnosed with dementia.
And I realised that by saying yes to every single thing, a, I was feeling about as stressed out as I was in my corporate life, which was one of the reasons why I changed. And b. Because I was saying yes to everything, it didn't allow me time for that stuff to, to, to deal with everything that was happening.
When I work so much, the first thing that goes is my health. Mm-hmm. That's not a good idea. At 52. It's okay when you're 25, but when you're 52, knock it off. This is me talking to myself, not not telling other people what they should be doing. And one of my friends a really good friend of mine who's, who's a very successful author, she said, Hannah, You do understand that the word no is a complete sentence, right?
So I've been practicing that. I add on the thank you. You know? No, thank you. So yes, I do. I do think that you can do too much. And in my case, it's very often self-inflicted because I want to do stuff. I want to try stuff. I, oh, there's an opportunity, of course I want to do that. But you know what I've learned that maybe saying no is actually better sometimes just before you just go, yeah, sure.
Just, and again, this is my advice to myself and anyone who wants to pick pieces of this and apply themselves to themselves, feel free. Just maybe take a breath and see, is this actually going to be useful? Is this actually going to be helpful? If yes, can you fit it into your schedule? If no, then don't do it.
So that's what I'm practicing this year or trying to more or less successfully.
[00:27:53] Kristin: I think I probably said to all of you at some point during our original chats that especially with all of you being so brilliant, I always take away something. It's, you know, I, I put it under this guise of, I wanna speak to women who've changed their lives and or careers after 35.
But really I'm just greedily hogging in all your advice. And I feel like every single thing that, I mean, they, they were obviously not the same answer at all, but applying to my own life, yes, grab all the creative things. Yes, I can find a way to integrate them. Yes, say no. I keep saying yes, but breathe, say no sometimes, you know, find these passions to only pursue the things you love or that are going to, is it going to help, is it going to further something along?
So brilliant. Thank you. I will steal that and I hope some of our listeners will as well. I mentioned something about I. Peak feminism. And the reason, because I have all of you here, I think you all have your different, in the same way you have different answers to the last question. You all have different versions of maybe what you think feminism is, but at the moment I feel like we're at this weird crossroads where, you know, the Barbie films come out and people are talking about, you know, strong women and we're, we're all women supporting women.
And, we do have this, this option maybe to change careers where it wouldn't have been, we don't have to play by this playbook. At the same time, I also feel like we're in a weird moment where there's so much pushback to. You know, I'll use the Barbie film as an example again, but it's like feminism will kill us all kind of things that I've seen on Instagram or on Twitter or things well, x whatever.
So I'm, I'm curious because we've all lived, you know, a decent amount of time now. We're all, at least past 35, I will say that the changes we've seen in our lives about what feminism means and kind of where we are with all of that. We have such conflicting things going on right now, so I'm wondering where you feel like we are with it in your own lives or in, in society in general
[00:29:54] Louise: It's an interesting one and I've seen a few discussions and kind of started to be involved in a discussion and then, and [00:30:00] felt like this Barbie thing is gonna grow. So I, I'm just gonna like step back. I haven't seen it. I saw a trailer for it back in this earlier in the year, but I haven't been to see it yet.
But a lot of my work that I do because it's mostly with women, it's about kind of connecting with feminine energy. So quite different to, to feminism because it's about more of an essence and the majority of women that I work with in my yoga practice and, you know, in the other parts of work I do, the retreats I host.
Much of that is for women that are navigating menopause and often feeling this complete disconnect from that, which makes 'em a woman. So my kind of perspective on it is more from an energy based point of view perhaps. But I do feel that there's this kind of I was gonna, I, I, as I said, I host retreats and I really believe in the power of going on retreats.
And particularly what some of us have just been talking there about having too many, too many strings to our bow. It, it does lead sometimes to, I think Hannah was saying at point, she's felt as burnt out as she, as she was as a CEO. So for me, I know that I need to go on retreats as well as host them.
And I almost signed up for one towards the end of last year, I could feel like the energy coming was, it was gonna be too much of a, it was too masculine, this energy. And I, and so I do feel on your question that some of the, some of the feminism has become quite masculine, its behavior. I don't know if that's a controversial thing to say, but I I, I feel that, you know, you were saying how is it saturated?
Have we come to like peak feminism? I think feminism for me is a, is a completely different thing, but I do feel that we are kind of trying to be as often there's, there's lots of energy that feels like actually it's, it's ma it's more masculine energy that we're, or, or behavior that we're exhibiting.
But like I said, that comes from a, a perspective of sometimes people say to me, can you just encapsulate like what it is that you do? And so I use the word woo woo often, it's quite woo woo and people are like, ah, yes, I get where you're coming from. And I guess that might have been a woowoo answer towards this question.
So interested to hear what other people feel about the same.
[00:32:27] Martina: I teach high school kids doing college classes early, and I feel like this is an extraordinary privilege to spend time with these 15, 16, 17 year old students, particularly the female students.
And what I am sort of witnessing, which just gives me so much hope for the future, is that there's sort of like, you know, you all did all your thinking, you did all of your framing, okay, all these labels, thank you very much. Now be quiet and go away because we are taking over the world. And I, what I see, and especially through their writing and the topics that they choose to speak about, is that it's, it's shifting a little bit away from whatever was feminism in the past towards more intersectionality of like, we as individuals have so many things going on.
It's not just about fighting the fight of feminism, it's about fighting the fight of racism. It's about fighting the fight of the gender wage gap. they're, they're, they're like addressing all of these things from various perspectives, which I'm not telling them that they have to do.
They're doing this on their own, they're coming to the table with all of these different things. Like, okay, this is the main topic 'cause I have to have a title for this, but it feeds into so many other things. And so I, I feel like the feminism has. Maybe already peaked, like we've passed what it was.
And to me that's a good thing. It served its purpose to get us to a certain place, but it was not, it was far from perfect. And I think the new this generation, gen Z is taking it on from a much more comprehensive perspective about both, about what they need as women, but also what people period
[00:34:19] Kristin: need and that not I was say people instead of feminism.
[00:34:23] Martina: exactly. And recognising that, you know, that not everybody fits into any particular model. We're all very complex. Just as we were talking about earlier, you know, like, can you do too much? We all have these different facets of ourselves and they're recognizing all of that. To me it feels like earlier than I certainly did as a young woman because I was sort of told, this is the lane that you belong in.
You go forward and you know, if you take an off ramp, you're gonna get in trouble. Whereas they're like, oh no, the world I can, I have access to all of it because of social media. They see things, they hear things, they learn about the whole [00:35:00] world. It's not just that they're on their phones. They're actually absorbing so much content from so many different places and experiences.
And I think it's, it's informing the way that they're going to shape what we once called feminism into something quite different. And again, from my perspective, I think that's, that's a good thing.
[00:35:19] Hannah: I have three, three sons. The eldest will be 20 this week and the other two will be 19.
The twins will be 19 in, in December. And it's really, really interesting to see their take following on a, a little bit from what you were saying, Martin, on, on things because I was never told that this was my women's lane and I needed to stay in it. Quite, quite the opposite actually. My grandfather, who was born in 1901, to put that into perspective, my dad, who was born in 1942, saw his dad, my grandfather dusting and put the vacuum around and whatnot.
So this is the, the guy born in 1901. You can imagine what his friends thought about that his wife was sick and my dad had two older sisters, and yet they were not the ones expected to take over. It was everybody's gonna pitch in. So my, my dad was never, has never been this macho guy, and him and my mom were together for 60 years and, and they were always equals.
That was how I was raised. So I never questioned what my lane should be ever, which is that. I can do whatever I want. You know, in terms of career wise, just because I'm a woman, why can't I be an astronaut? Not that I ever became one, I probably wouldn't pass the test I'd throw up in the dizzy, in the dizzy chair.
But it. That's the way with my husband. I mentioned earlier that, that he was a stay-at-home dad. We have the same partnership. He's an electrician by trade, so one would be forgiven for thinking He's this macho dude. He's, he's not, he sows he he'll murder me for saying this Fictionally, of course. He, he sows better than I, I can manage a button at a push, you know, he upholded our entire city once it, so, and he cooks and whatnot.
So it's, it's always been very balanced and our kids always have always seen that. And I asked them the other day, I said, do you, what do you think of the relationship that, that we have? And they said, well, as it should be. It's, it's balanced. So that's what I'm trying to convey to our three kids. And hopefully they can convey that further on.
But what is interesting. On the one hand I see them saying things about equality and whatnot, and yet when I hear them talking about, I'll say girlfriends past, not current ones, it's that the girlfriends expect the guy, my sons, to show for them around to pay for everything. I'm thinking, hang on a
minute, that, so I, I get this conflicting.
Things have improved and yet they haven't. And it's coming from both and it's just, it's just, it's weird. I'm sure we have made progress on certain things, but then on others, I think we're still stuck in those traditional roles that we are saying we don't want to be in. And yet I see younger generations still, still following those.
And I, I, I'm having some trouble wrapping my head around that. Nothing wrong with paying for your girlfriend's dinner from time to time, as long as it's reciprocated. Right? That's so, it's not always expected. So it's, I don't know. It's just being the mom of three teenage sons. I don't have any daughters.
So I can't, I can't speak to that. I'd be interested to, to see if anybody does have teenage daughters. What, what their take is on it. If things have progressed as much as we would like. Perhaps part of us still wants not, I, I, I don't want to say not be equals No. That, that's wrong.
But still have some traditional values that remain because, because we like them.
[00:39:00] Taiwo: Do we? I don't know. I think that actually what feminism has done has given people the choice. It's the choices that they've been, I, I kind of, I'm sort of the generation whose aunties would've burned their bras.
And so we were the first, we were the first kind of grownups, grownup women who were kind of, it was almost frowned upon to be. To, to, to want that traditional model. And so there were, there, there were people that wanted that traditional model but went in, went in the other direction because they felt that it, it's, it was, it reflected on them negatively is they did want that traditional model.
And and I think that what, what is happening now and I, I, I don't have children like I said, but I see, I have nephews and nieces and friends', children who, some of them do want that traditional, and they're quite open about wanting that traditional model. And I think that we've, what we've have, what's happened is that we've got to a point [00:40:00] now that if that's what they want and their partner wants that, then great.
If they want the other bit, and the, the, you know, you find them, you find the partner who kind of shares the same values as you, and that is okay now it's no longer and nobody's going to It is going to frown upon whether or not upon the decisions that you make. I think the, where we still have to we still have a lot of work to do is about women and children and women who don't necessarily, that, that don't have children and the judgments that are made about women who don't have children and judgments that are made about women who don't want children.
And I think that that's where there's still quite a bit of work to be done.
[00:40:46] Hannah: That's such an interesting perspective. Thank you.
[00:40:49] Kristin: I think also bringing it back to what Louise said, in my opinion maybe peak feminism, if we look at feminism, it doesn't have to be aggressive, it's more about equality. It's about humanism as I said before.
But I think ultimately if we could take the feminine energy that Louise is talking about, but it feminine doesn't mean. Woman. It means, I think what you're talking about, Louise, like, you know, what is traditionally female? What's traditionally male, what's aggressive, what's soft, what's empathetic. If it's okay for everyone to have those qualities, as in I can be a woman, I can be strong, I can sometimes be aggressive, that doesn't make me a bitch.
Or you know, whatever term comes along with that. I could be a man and I could be sensitive, I could be a leader and show empathy whether I'm a man or a woman, you know, I could show those qualities to me. That's the thing that would get us to the place that we can all be in a good place. And I mean, along with that goes gender gap, you know, closing it goes along with the intersectionality of, you know, sexuality and race.
And, and I think once we could get to a point that those type of qualities don't have to equate to your sex or your gender and. You can become a leader without that aggression, then we won't have these people in social media saying, feminism's gonna kill us all. Or we won't feel the need as women to really shove the fact that we're women, you know?
Uh, And, and it can be a lot more balanced, I think. So I think we're still working on that because everybody feels like their side has to be a certain way instead of maybe finding that nice middle that can kind of cover everyone
[00:42:30] Hannah: Must be a good person. Yeah. Yeah. For me, it's, let's just be good. You know? That's what I try and say to the kids. Just be, just be a fundamentally decent, kind human being, whether that's in person or online, because it's free. It doesn't cost, and, and it makes you feel good. It makes. The other person feel good, and if everybody could just be kind and tolerant.
Tolerant is also also big on the agenda. And I agree completely about the, the, the comment that you made Tara about, about women not wanting kids. I didn't until I met my husband that absolutely, no, and it was because he stepped back from his career for a while that we, that we had kids and none of my previous partners would've ever dreamed about doing that.
But having said that, I think that from what I've encountered at that point, that was 20 years ago. The guys, when they learned that I was working full-time, were very complimentary towards me about working full-time. Wow, that's really cool. And admirable and main breadwinner. That was sole breadwinner, blah, blah.
Some women were, but in particular, I remember a number of conversations with women who would say, mm-hmm. So you are, you are working full-time. Yeah. Mm-hmm. You have kids? Yeah. Yeah. I have three. You have three kids and you're working full-time? Yeah. My husband's a stay-at-home dad. Oh, well that's okay then.
Didn't realize I needed the permission, but there you go. But, so there, I found there was this, this real disconnect, whereas women were super complimentary towards Rob for being a stay-at-home dad. Wow, that's amazing. You know, and seriously, three kids in 16 months, come on. I mean, that's a heck of a lot of work.
Whereas men towards him, some, not all, but some would say, dude, you're a stay at home dad. What's wrong with you? So it, it was really odd the experiences that, that, that we had. So I think absolutely right. There's a ton of work to be, to be done there. If you want kids, great. If you don't want them, great.
Just, you know, It's nobody's business other than your own. Mm-hmm.
Kristin: I'm not ready to end this conversation yet. The panel of women that I've been so lucky to speak with have so many interesting things to say about this topic and more that The Second Chapter, episode 100 will also be the second chapter, episode 101. With more conversation with this amazing group of women, the panel will have the chance to ask each other a few questions.
[00:45:00] We talk a bit about perimenopause and menopause, and about the things we are doing to try and help change the world.
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