‘Work Strife Balance’ is allegedly the book that Freedman’s husband and co-owner of her media empire has been urging her to write ‘for years’. Within, she has attempted to pen her feminist manifesto: decrying the concept of ‘balance’, allegedly exposing all about her chaotic life, and giving sage wisdom to young impressionable women and men.
For anyone familiar with Freedman’s network of websites and podcasts aimed at women and enlightened men, this book is largely a retread of all her other work. I’m disappointed to say that I learned nothing new when reading this book, and sadly it adds little of substance to the modern conversation about feminism.
The best part of the book is the chapter wherein she writes a candid letter to her sons about pornography, to be read when they hit adolescence. This was the highlight of the book and something I’ll likely return to when my little guy reaches a certain age.
The remainder of the manifesto; however, doesn’t say an awful lot. There are plenty of self deprecating remarks that I think are supposed to make Freedman seem more relatable, but instead just alienated me because I know how hard she works.
Though she describes herself as a hopeless, accident-prone fool, in reality Freedman is a shrewd business woman. She’s trying hard in ‘Work Strife Balance’ to convince the reader that she’s bumbling through life, but she is actually the epitome of hustle culture, to the point that she is now charging other women to learn from her and become a ‘lady start-up’.
I kept waiting to read something that made me think differently about an issue, or challenged me in some way. Heck, I’d settle for even feeling mildly offended! At least that’s an emotion! Instead, Freedman checks her privilege so much, and dances around difficult issues so inoffensively, that she has really only succeeded in creating a few hundred pages of feminist fluff.
2 sequined stars out of 5.