Who is taught perfect or brave?

The next podcast season will focus on females and topics relating to health, female empowerment, and relationships. The credit for this idea belongs to a good friend of mine. When she mentioned it a few weeks ago, there were a few people that came to mind instantly as women who I think would fit the topic. I will not spoil the surprise by saying who they are now. However, I will say this: after we decided on the topic, I could not help but think about it frequently.

It mainly took the lens of what I wish I was taught or had learned when I was younger and perhaps what I would teach myself if I could reparent myself or simply go back in time and tell myself a few things.

Something else that kept coming to mind was something I heard quite some time ago: “Boys are raised to take risks and girls are raised to be perfect.” For the life of me, I could not figure out for a while where I had heard it. Then, after some digging, I realized it was from a TED Talk from about 10 years ago! The 10 years ago part blew my mind.

If you want to watch it, the link is here. The talk is “Teach Girls Bravery, Not Perfection” by Reshma Saujani.

As I prepare for the podcast season, I thought I should do some research on my own, so I decided to rewatch the talk on YouTube. Below are the key points that I wrote down in no particular order (as I wrote them in my notebook):

• Brave, not perfect

• Many women gravitate to careers they know they will be great in/perfect in (is that still true today?)

• Boys taught to play rough, swing high, climb to the top of the monkey bars, and jump

• Girls raised to be perfect, boys raised to be brave

• For girls — higher IQ, more likely to give up in class; boys more likely to continue as the problem is seen as a challenge

• Men will apply to a job if they only meet 60% of the requirements, while women apply if they meet 100% (aspire to be perfect, plus they are overly cautious)

• Example: female coding student shows nothing instead of showing progress (perfection or bust)

• Boys say: “Professor, there is something wrong with the code.” Girls say: “Professor, something is wrong with me.”

• Girls should be shown they are loved and accepted for being courageous, not perfect, and be comfortable with imperfection

  
  

Now, provided this was 10 years ago, I think some of this still applies. However, as I listened, it piqued my curiosity to see what still applies today and who is speaking on this now.

When we talk about being brave and courageous, I think of Brené Brown, who may be the next stop on the podcast prep research journey.