At an event for female judges in the 1980s, during Sandra Day O’Connor’s term as the first female Supreme Court justice, a law professor asked, “How do you take care of your family and have a career?” O’Connor answered: “Always put your family first.”
It was an inspiring answer, but all the trailblazing women in the room understood it was not the full truth. As her biographer wrote, the women in the audience suspected that the real answer to the question was “By constant struggle,” by painful choice, and by trade-offs. We can’t be flip about it; putting your family first ahead of your ambition is essential; but it’s also tough. If it were easy, every parent would do it.
Indeed, later in life, O’Connor would talk about how “desperately hard” it was to balance work and family. She would try to talk to her law clerks, male and female, about this struggle. She didn’t dance around how hard would it be. She shared what she had learned. And most important, in being up front, she provided them, and now us, the relief of knowing: it’s not possible without struggle.