This fear is as real as the hopefulness of the dream itself. One of the trademarks of my work is that I try to prepare every client I work with for the reality of discouragement. I tell people that they most likely will feel discouraged at some point. They may encounter something in the world or within themselves that makes them fee/like giving up; or they might feel negative or critical of the career counselling process. I invite them to discuss such feelings as they arise.

I have found that talking about the discouragement is as powerful as talking about dreams. It allows a woman to see just how she has kept herself from achieving her career dream. It allows her to find the strength to meet obstacles in the future, and, most importantly, it gives her the opportunity to tell me how I can support and help her when she begins to feel like it is impossible.

Dreaming is difficult for women. It goes against so much of our socialization. We are all familiar with the various statistics and stereotypes that describe women's traditional place in the workforce, the result of this socialization process. Women work in job ghettoes, they are secretaries, clerks, teachers, social service workers, sales clerks, bank tellers, waitresses. They are less likely to climb corporate ladders or to become electricians, plumbers, or welders. They frequently work in part-time positions with no benefits or job security.

For society, the problem of women's position in the labour force will require massive changes: legislative reforms, institutional change (e.g. how daycare and training are provided), a great change in attitudes and social norms. In our work as career counsellors with individuals, we see the causal ties of the current statistics and social norms.

Although the career counsellor is not an agent of social change, she is a facilitator of a kind of individual change which can lead to social change. She helps women to see beyond the limited self-definition which society imposes. She helps them to dream beyond the stereotyped images of women's work. She helps individual women to fight the social expectation that her need for fulfillment is not important. She encourages her to contemplate being a successful, ambitious, and powerful individual who can make an impact on the world.

Giving women permission to dream is the vital link between a limited self-concept which society imposes and the development of personal visions which can expand society's notions of women's capabilities. That is why it is such an important dimension to career planning. When we support a woman's dream, we are helping her and all women to find a way to make career satisfaction a real possibility.

Reprinted from WEdf, Winter 1985,
Vol. 4. 2

Sue Berlove is a career counselor in private practice in the Toronto area.