Do you ever have the feeling of getting to the end of a day, totally exhausted and poured out, but not really able to see the fruit of all your labour? Has everyone got clean clothes for tomorrow? I need to get that birthday present for the party on Saturday. The swimming lesson fees are due, they need cash. We haven’t had the new child in our son’s class to play yet, I must track down his Mum at pick up, I feel guilty about that. I haven’t phoned my Mum for two days, I hope she’s doing okay. Last week’s pasta is festering at the back of the fridge, I need to clean that before it starts taking over. My friend didn’t seem herself when she popped in to the office today. I’ll text her when I get a chance. I must make sure I grab some milk for work tomorrow, the harmony of the team is so much better when we have a morning coffee together. I feel guilty for not offering to take a meal to a friend when I know she has so much on at the moment (even though I don’t have the capacity to this week).
There’s a term for it – ‘emotional labour.’ This is work done predominantly (not exclusively!) by women and it almost always goes unnoticed (even by ourselves!).
What is it?
The concept of emotional labour was first put forward by sociologist Arlie Hochschild in 1983 in her book, The Managed Heart. She defined it as “the management of feeling to create a publicly observable facial and bodily display.” The term has been connected to the workplace, describing the management of emotions and expressions to fulfil the requirements of a job and put others at ease, even when we don’t feel like it. But its presence and implications reach into every aspect of community.
It’s being the unsung ‘emotional manager’ in the family, workplace or whatever community you operate in. Carrying things in your head that go unseen and can get taken for granted. Reading the atmosphere and consistently bending yourself to enhance it (even when you don’t feel positive). One woman recently described the pressure of her presence to “be enough, without being too much.” It’s taking the lead in thoughts of ‘I need to keep my composure here, my outward expressions affect the atmosphere of this room.’ It is the effort that goes into noticing that people are not feeling themselves, asking questions and listening to the answers, anticipating needs, apologising, considering how others can be built up. It is responding to the piercing tantrums of your toddler, or the loaded silences of your teenager.
What are its effects?
I’ve loved chatting to so many brilliant local women, being let in, in some part, to their lives. Finding out what motivates them, what frustrates them, what battles and barriers they might be facing. A common theme that comes up again and again is feeling overwhelmed with responsibility and the intensity of a season of life, yet at the same time feeling unseen and undervalued, never getting to the end of the mental list. Emotional labour can ravage energy stores – so much is being achieved but often for very little tangible feedback.
It’s very difficult to quantify it, touch it, feel it or see it, but it’s very definitely there, keeping us all living and breathing in connection.
In the workplace, as technology continues to advance, the significance of emotional labour is only going to grow. It gives to colleagues and customers what machines can’t: the ability to read a social situation and respond to put others at ease, building an empathy for those around us (especially the difficult customer or colleague), setting an atmosphere, a culture of care with relationships at the heart of each thought. It’s what makes companies relevant and relatable.
A few weeks ago, our school lollipop lady was absent for a day. I couldn’t believe how different it felt approaching the school gates without her friendly welcome. It made me really think about just how much added value she brings to her role. Eliciting waves and smiles from toddlers in buggies, remembering names of the hundreds of children she sees, initiating eye contact with parents for a lovely welcoming “good morning, how are you?”
On a day to day level, do we recognise others’ emotional labour and affirm it? When my Mum visits a family member of ours now in a care home, it’s as though she is visiting the whole floor of residents and seeing her in action is a very beautiful thing: remembering names, passing on poetry books, following up on little things she’s been told, noticing the resident who maybe doesn’t get so many visits or who is harder to engage with. Growing up, her powerful radar for hidden need was something that I saw on a daily basis. She kept a calendar hanging in the kitchen of significant dates (birthdays, bereavements, a friend’s chemotherapy schedule) as a reminder for her to ring and share that she was thinking of someone, or to offer practical help. But she’d be the first to say that she had achieved little that day.
How do we manage emotional labour?
So how do we affirm this constant, immeasurable work and try to manage these seemingly impossible expectations and the feeling of never getting to the end of the invisible list?
I think that recognising the weight of emotional labour and acknowledging it’s presence is really important. I was so relieved when I heard that there was a term for it. I felt like it somehow validated this invisible work and the importance of it all. It also helped me to feel that I’m not alone in experiencing the weariness and perceived thanklessness of this work. By giving language to something that is so commonly felt, it brings a togetherness in this and a recognition that unseen labour is NOT unfruitful labour. It is vital labour. It’s relatively small tasks that make a huge difference to how communities operate.
It can be what connects individuals, what changes the atmosphere of a school pick up, what helps someone settle in a job, what makes a neighbour feel seen, what keeps families just one step ahead of chaos.
Guilt vs shame
But while emotional labour is important, we need to be mindful that we’re not becoming martyrs to this largely unseen realm of toil. There is no cause – no matter how worthy and thoughtful – worth burning ourselves out for beyond what we can sustain. What is manageable for today and what can wait for another day or be verbalised and even delegated?
A lot of guilt can accompany emotional labour. Guilt is uncomfortable, but can actually help us make better choices next time. It’s stopping that guilt (“I failed to do that thing as I would have wanted to it”) turning into shame (“I AM a failure”).
Brene Brown in her research around shame (Shame Resilience Theory, 2006) talks about viewing the feeling of guilt as “adaptive and helpful – it’s holding something we’ve done or failed to do up against our values and feeling psychological discomfort.” Whereas shame is “the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging – something we’ve experienced, done, or failed to do makes us unworthy of connection.”
Conversations around emotional labour are important, we can encourage each other so much in what we are already doing so well for our communities. These conversations and encouragements build connection and validate this vital work. When we know we’re not alone and can share our challenges, shame struggles to survive.
How can we support each other?
What small steps could we take on a personal, everyday level to manage this labour and encourage others?
1. Recognise your own emotional labour
What you are achieving, instinctively, constantly, on a daily basis is amazing. Consider some of the things you HAVE thought about and acted on today that have made a difference to the atmosphere you’re in. Try to think of what HAS been done, not just about what needs doing. In the “how has your day been” chat, could you report on some of the emotional labour that you have achieved, not just the tangible work done? This helps model being an effective emotional labourer to others (if you have children, you are opening their eyes to how to love with added value “was there someone you noticed today that you felt you could help or listen to?”). If there are others around you that don’t see the emotional labour as you do, it helps them to understand more. By opening up the conversation, we shed light on to what is already being done so brilliantly (the “have dones”). This light is powerful in dispelling the potential shadows of shame that can creep in with the silent, nagging “haven’t dones.”
2. Recognise someone else’s emotional labour
Who has said, done or modelled something to you that has made a positive impact? Tell them! If someone’s presence is missed when they’re not there, tell them. When the seemingly unseen things are noticed it brings a real sense of value, builds confidence and spurs us on to keep going.
3. Acknowledge that emotional labour takes its toll
It may not fit the traditional labels of work but it is constant and wearing. Your own health is so important to your family and your community. How are you looking after your own needs? Do you need to ask for help to sustain the vital work you are doing? Can any of your emotional labour be shared? (Now there’s a whole other blog waiting to be written!…)