Ambitious Like a Mother

To achieve real work–life balance – and financial independence – mothers should prioritize their professional ambitions, not just family life.

Author Lara Bazelon knows all too well what it means to be a working mother. She’s a law professor and mother of two, and her mother was a doctor. As a child, Bazelon was keenly aware that her mother, who earned her medical degree in the early 1970s, was different from the other kids’ moms, none of whom worked outside the home.

Although both of Bazelon’s parents worked long hours, only her mother was expected to cook, clean and care for Lara and her three sisters. Her father, a high-powered lawyer, often traveled for work, sometimes for long stretches; but her mother rarely left home for business. Dr. Bazelon accepted these gendered inequities, even though they exhausted her and limited her professional opportunities.

While proud of her mother’s accomplishments, Bazelon made a conscious decision not to follow completely in her footsteps. Instead, she chose to keep her legal career on track throughout her children’s lives. Bazelon did heed one piece of...