Defining a nebulous term like happiness is difficult – but unpacking it in the context of a silver woman’s life in modern-day Singapore, ranked Asia’s happiest country in the United Nations 2023 World Happiness Report, is even harder.
On International Women’s Day, we speak to the Singapore Council of Women’s Organisations (SCWO) president, Junie Foo, to find out what she thinks happiness looks like for the country’s growing cohort of older women – who, apart from having to deal with vicissitudes of ageing, also have to contend with shifting societal norms and expectations.
In her 2007 book The How of Happiness, American positive psychology professor Sonja Lyubomirsky describes happiness as “the experience of joy, contentment, or positive well-being, combined with a sense that one’s life is good, meaningful, and worthwhile”.
The 56-year-old tells us that happiness essentially is what SCWO is working towards for women in Singapore as its national coordinating body for the 70 organisations here.
But what exactly does that look like for modern silver women, and what are the steps needed to achieve it? Foo, — who is also founding co-chair of BoardAgender, an initiative which encourages the inclusion of more women on corporate boards, and first female chairperson on the board of the Singapore Kindness Movement – lays it out.
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What does happiness look like for the modern silver woman?
The modern woman is empowered – with the freedom of choice to do what they want to do because it brings them joy.
A lot of healthy senior women are happy women – they have a social life, they exercise, and they have a circle of support for them to turn to.
In my interactions with them, I know women who are still hard at work in their corporate life; those who have taken a step back to care for their loved ones; what makes them happy is that they have chosen to do what they want to do.
And importantly, they have spouses who support them in their jobs and encourage them to fulfil their potential.
Are women more able to achieve this happiness nowadays, and why?
Many of them have more choices nowadays because of greater female participation in the workplace.
Senior women now are more financially independent compared to earlier generations, which helps them to find their own happiness. If they want to go out and have a nice meal with their friends, they are easily able to do that.
They also recognise that self-care is more important. Increasingly, there’s an awareness that we have to look after ourselves before we can care for other people. We see this especially in women in their 30s and 40s who have more spending power.
For silvers who were brought up differently and taught the importance of being frugal, they might not want to be seen as a spendthrift, even now.
There’s a need to undergo a mindset change at a societal level.
You don’t have to live a life of sacrifice as a mum, in terms of money, opportunity or time. You should be able to take a break from caring for your children, and it shouldn’t be seen as shirking your duties.
Do men, then, have to shift their mindsets as well?
Yes, spouses should recognise that they need to put in their fair share as well. This applies more to younger couples, where women are now expected to take up a lot more responsibilities in their career.
In turn, their husbands or partners should help out at home in terms of childrearing, housework and so on.
What more needs to be done to hasten this mindset shift?
Today’s young are tomorrow’s new old, so policies that affect younger people will in turn affect future seniors.
If you really want a mindset shift, the keyword is flexible workplace arrangements – to enable more women to remain in the workforce while also caring for their children, ageing parents or in-laws.
We currently have two presenting issues where we don’t have enough women going back to the workforce after becoming mothers, or finding it difficult to balance work and caregiving for an ageing parent, so employers lose out on talent and eventually, once these women reach their silver years, find out that they don’t have enough in their CPF (Central Provident Fund) for an adequately comfortable retirement.
Childcare leave should be interchangeable with family care leave so that women who are single or married but do not have children can avail their leave days for the caregiving of family members.
This should apply not just to women, but men too, to signal that it shouldn’t be the woman who is taken as a caregiver by default. It doesn’t have to be the daughter, or even the daughter-in-law, who takes a senior to the hospital. The son can do it too.
The policymakers have to be convinced first, and then the employers and employees. It’s a bit of a cliche to say this, but mindset change requires a whole-society approach.
