You include that you want her to becomes serious about striving to reach her potential . What does that mean ? Would she be reaching per potential by working 20 hours a week ? Why is your idea of what her potential should be better than hers ? See , a cultural shift may have happened there as well . Reaching your potential used to mean working 40 hours a week , then working more so you could outwork your coworker and get promoted . Was that a good thing ? Maybe at the time , although there ' d be a lot of children with missed dance recitals that would probably disagree . Is it still a good thing ? Responding just on this point in my view , the goal of adulthood on this point in particular is to form economic households that are selfsufficient . This doesn ' t mean everyone works 40 hours per week but that the adults in the household form interdependent relationships that allow the needs of all to be met . This is different , in my view , from a is everyone reaching their potential because I ' m not focusing on or measuring that . And I ' m not saying , at all , that moms with young children should be working . What I am saying , as it ' s what I believe , is that adults should work out arrangements that provide for economic selfsufficiency among the household as a whole . This might mean mom or dad staying out of work when kids are small , but it really , really , really means , IMO , people living within their means and that looks like racheting back expectations about lifestyle for many people . I also , and this may just be cultural but I don ' t think so think that when you start reproducing , you become the adults in the household and you need to figure out how to make it work as an independent family unit . This doesn ' t mean you don ' t live with a parent . but it becomes they live with you vs . you live with them , if that makes sense .