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The only reason you're seeing more ambitious women breaking up with less ambitious men, is because women got to a point where they realized they were doing it all on their own already. The only thing they may have been getting out of the deal was sex. Ambition isn't about climbing mountains and scaling volcanos. It's about wanting something more out of life that is actually obtainable.
Say there's a management position at work and it requires very little extra work and will not increase your stress level. All it requires is to work one extra hour every other Friday. An ambitious person would see the extra hour as nothing and take the position to gain more experience and accrue more income. A non ambitious person would turn the position down, because they are playing golf during that extra hour.
Not everyone is ambitious, but there's plenty of people that turn down easy advancements, because they don't want anything more out of life. When a woman is within a relationship and she's being promoted at work, while her partner is not trying to advance somewhat himself, it can cause a bit of a rift within the relationship.
Men have been ambitious from the beginning of time. Now, women are becoming more ambitious along the way, but still don't always expect men to stop being ambitious. Men are trying to take easy street, women have caught on, and the women are kicking the men out.
There is not always a connection between "ambition" and "success."
Are these women dumbing boyfriends because they lack ambition or have not found success? There is a difference. A guy can be very ambitious and hard working, but is at his maximum earning potential based on his skill/trade/education, etc.
Or, a guy could be way underemployed (or unemployed) because he is lazy and would rather do "fun" things than work hard to improve his employment situation.
From the women I know, they tend to evaluate and value more on whether a guy is a hard worker, and puts forth effort, and not how many zeroes are on the paycheck.
There is not always a connection between "ambition" and "success."
Excellent point! To elaborate, it is possible to be "ambitious" in the sense of striving and angling for gain, for promotion, for some sort of increase - but to remain mired in comparative limitation. It's also possible to achieve substantial elevation without necessarily having much concerted plan or overt drive.
As an example, some people are ambitious to start their own business, but keep failing. Others realize the folly of this, pursue stable employment with a large enterprise that offers a defined-benefit pension, remain there for 40 years, and retire comfortably. Some are ambitious to make a killing in the stock market, jumping from trade to trade, but ultimately obtain a poor cumulative lifetime rate of return. Others numbly buy-and-hold a broadbased index fund, explicitly repudiating aim to become fabulously wealthy, but in so doing attaining substantial affluence over the course of decades.
Ambition can be flippant, coarse and boorish.
Also, a talented and naturally astute person might achieve much without assiduous effort, while others struggle just to remain near the middle. Who is more appealing romantically?
It's also important to distinguish between ambition in the workplace and ambition in general. A person might be wholly dedicated to workplace advancement, to the exclusion of social-life, domestic-life, hobbies and the like. Is such a person appealing relationship-material?
In fact I'd argue directly against the OP's point. Of the few examples of divorce that I've seen in my circle, most stem from the wife's disaffection with her husband's having been too oriented to workplace pursuits. He travels too much on business, stays late in the evenings, takes work home, and is most animated when talking about work-projects. His energies are too narrowly devoted to work, straining the relationship.
Last edited by ohio_peasant; 04-03-2015 at 08:36 AM..
Say there's a management position at work and it requires very little extra work and will not increase your stress level. All it requires is to work one extra hour every other Friday. An ambitious person would see the extra hour as nothing and take the position to gain more experience and accrue more income. A non ambitious person would turn the position down, because they are playing golf during that extra hour.
No, actually a non-ambitious person would take that job too since there's very little extra work and no added stress. 1 hour out of the week isn't a big sacrifice. What distinguishes an ambitious person from a non-ambitious one is that the former is willing to work long hours, endure high stress, and deal with politics if it'll advance their career. The non-ambitious person doesn't think any of that is worth it. In my field, I could make a lot more money as a Team Lead or Project Manager. But I don't want to work 12 hour days, travel to see clients, or deal with office politics.
Quote:
Originally Posted by weezerfan84
Not everyone is ambitious, but there's plenty of people that turn down easy advancements, because they don't want anything more out of life.
No, they turn down the easy advancements because they're not being offered enough in return. I've been offered Team Lead positions plenty of times in my career. But I always turned them down because the salary increase was minimal.
Quote:
Originally Posted by weezerfan84
Men have been ambitious from the beginning of time. Now, women are becoming more ambitious along the way, but still don't always expect men to stop being ambitious. Men are trying to take easy street, women have caught on, and the women are kicking the men out.
Plenty of women are happy with non-ambitious men. What matters is whether there's a big disparity in the relationship. If you're content working on a team of engineers, but you're partner is wanting to be a manager or director, she may see you as a bad influence. Likewise, you may feel like she's too focused on her career. As a non-ambitious person, I make it clear when I start dating someone that I'm not an ambitious person. So if they're working to climb the corporate ladder and want a partner who's just as ambitious, they'd better look elsewhere.
Women tend to not want anything to do with guys that they look down on in anyway unless they are forced to. They want to click but they don't base the relationship on this. It's just a feel good manipulation that they go along with guys who are socially stronger than they are. If a women ever loses her suspension of disbelief that the guy is in full control she'll be panicking for the eject button.
No, actually a non-ambitious person would take that job too since there's very little extra work and no added stress. 1 hour out of the week isn't a big sacrifice. What distinguishes an ambitious person from a non-ambitious one is that the former is willing to work long hours, endure high stress, and deal with politics if it'll advance their career. The non-ambitious person doesn't think any of that is worth it. In my field, I could make a lot more money as a Team Lead or Project Manager. But I don't want to work 12 hour days, travel to see clients, or deal with office politics.
No, they turn down the easy advancements because they're not being offered enough in return. I've been offered Team Lead positions plenty of times in my career. But I always turned them down because the salary increase was minimal.
Plenty of women are happy with non-ambitious men. What matters is whether there's a big disparity in the relationship. If you're content working on a team of engineers, but you're partner is wanting to be a manager or director, she may see you as a bad influence. Likewise, you may feel like she's too focused on her career. As a non-ambitious person, I make it clear when I start dating someone that I'm not an ambitious person. So if they're working to climb the corporate ladder and want a partner who's just as ambitious, they'd better look elsewhere.
True. People want what people want. I want a woman in my life that's ambitious as well, yet can still separate work from home life. I work 45-50 hours every week, while my other team members are happy working only 40. What separates them from me, is I'm willing to take on the extra workload for the extra income and notoriety. I also have champagne taste on a beer budget, so to get the finer things in life I have to work for them. I don't have another person in my life contributing, so it's all on me.
Ambition is seen different by everyone. Ambition to me isn't always working long hours and taking work home. Ambition can be as much as working the same hours, yet covering more ground, because you've figured out how to be more efficient. Every January we implement new ways to be efficient in my field. My hours haven't picked up in the office, yet I'm involved outside of the office doing community involvement and being involved on boards. In order for me to take on those added responsibilities that I get enjoyment from, I had to figure out how to be more efficient at and away from my desk.
It still doesn't require me to take any work home and I'm out of the office everyday at 5PM and the only work I may do on a weekend is a charitable event. My career also isn't involving waiting on someone else to make a decision at 11PM. I'm not an Executive. I'm a Mid-Level manager.
I don't want to work 12 hour days a late into the night every night either. I'm just not the person who's satisfied with scraping by. That doesn't excite me.
I'm an ambitious, type A sort who is mired unhappily with a non-ambitious guy, in a relationship he desperately wants to go on until he dies and I want to find a way out of within the next few years.
For me it's really not about him having the kind of ambition that goes along with career, it's about general enthusiasm for life. I've come to understand that he doesn't want to really experience the world. He wants to build a comfortable cave for himself to dwell in, with a few friends and activities to come to him. I want to meet a million people, hear their stories, appreciate their art, and see new places. My biggest goals and dreams are out there and his are right there in the basement, or in a video game, whatever. I feel like he views life as just killing time until death. I'm all about LIVING. I like being optimistic and looking forward to the future. His dreams for the future are about what sort of cause he could honorably end his life with...fighting the good fight or something.
I'm getting to the point where I'm going to be easily able to support myself, I'm already doing most of the supporting for a family of 4, financially, now.
Point is...maybe some, at least, of these situations where ambitious women drop men who aren't so ambitious, is about the lifestyle they want to live, the things they like to experience or hope to experience before they die, and simple incompatibility of hopes, dreams, etc. I really don't think it's all about greed and status.
I'm an ambitious, type A sort who is mired unhappily with a non-ambitious guy, in a relationship he desperately wants to go on until he dies and I want to find a way out of within the next few years.
For me it's really not about him having the kind of ambition that goes along with career, it's about general enthusiasm for life. I've come to understand that he doesn't want to really experience the world. He wants to build a comfortable cave for himself to dwell in, with a few friends and activities to come to him. I want to meet a million people, hear their stories, appreciate their art, and see new places. My biggest goals and dreams are out there and his are right there in the basement, or in a video game, whatever. I feel like he views life as just killing time until death. I'm all about LIVING. I like being optimistic and looking forward to the future. His dreams for the future are about what sort of cause he could honorably end his life with...fighting the good fight or something.
I'm getting to the point where I'm going to be easily able to support myself, I'm already doing most of the supporting for a family of 4, financially, now.
Point is...maybe some, at least, of these situations where ambitious women drop men who aren't so ambitious, is about the lifestyle they want to live, the things they like to experience or hope to experience before they die, and simple incompatibility of hopes, dreams, etc. I really don't think it's all about greed and status.
Just curious, has he always been this way? What brought you together? I personally also could never live with a person like that unwilling to get out and explore and try new things.
I'm an ambitious, type A sort who is mired unhappily with a non-ambitious guy...
For me it's really not about him having the kind of ambition that goes along with career, it's about general enthusiasm for life. .... I feel like he views life as just killing time until death. I'm all about LIVING. ...
Point is...maybe some, at least, of these situations where ambitious women drop men who aren't so ambitious, is about the lifestyle they want to live, the things they like to experience or hope to experience before they die, and simple incompatibility of hopes, dreams, etc. I really don't think it's all about greed and status.
I'm the incongruous combination of a driven type-A personalty who nevertheless is convinced of the ridiculousness and senselessness of life. Sedulously dedicated to some task that crops up and grasps my attention, I nevertheless very much do think of it as killing time until death, and behold all of our pleasures and aspirations and achievements as being self-referential and vapid and ultimately without substance or merit. Minus a occasional theological references, when I read Ecclesiastes I bothered by only one thing: why didn't I write it first? But that conclusion belies its own object, for what would have been greater vanity?
The very antithesis of my persona would be "living life to the fullest". I'd rather live life to the least.
And this of course is utterly damning when trying to date.
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