To think there's no such thing as a "soft life"?

[TheBestThingthatAlmostHappened]

Working is hard- regardless of if you are slogging away in a minimum wage job and still struggling to make ends meet, or under pressure in a high-stress, high pay role.

Surviving off benefits is hard.

Living off a partner and the stress and judgement that comes with that is hard.

Even being born into money is hard if you believe the stories coming out of those families.

AIBU to think that the current generation of young women being told to seek a "soft life" are being lied to and no such thing exists?

I don’t think my life is hard. I live in a two bed flat with a toddler and a baby on the way. We both work. I would obviously like more and haven’t had a holiday in five years - but not stressing about how to put food on the table or petrol
in the car.
Id say my in laws have a soft life - both work part time, mortgage paid off before they were 50, passive incomes mean they have about £4k disposable income each month.

Ive never heard the term before
I know several SAHMs of teens/uni age kids, with well paid husbands. From the outside life doesnt look that hard. They have cleaners, gardeners, handyman to do things, go out for lunches, to pilates/gym/tennis/concerts/shows away for girls weekends etc, maybe there's difficult bits i dont know about but to me it seems a lot easier than working ft, or trying to live off benefits.
However i dont find my own life especially hard. I work ft and have teenage kids, ideally i would work pt if finances permitted.

Why don’t you do it anymore?

Re me living off my husband

I dont live off him anymore as he has retired. We have joint savings and we both have our own. He may have been the earning the money but he says he couldn’t have done any of it without me. His job involved us living in countries where spouses were (at the time) not allowed to work so not only was it impractical for me to work but it would have been illegal. So I made the most of the situation. 😅I’m not a ladies-who-lunch kind of person but I am someone who finds it easy to fill my time constructively . I’m sociable, love sports and enjoy getting involved in things. I know that I’ve been fortunate. I think I’ve had an ‘easy life’

I think it's a backlash to all the other social stuff talking about "side hustles" and "the grind"...I don't think there's anything wrong with people just wanting just the one job (and some spare time), or to afford to be a SAHM for a few years.

I mean shit can happen in any situation, I used to be (briefly) a princess on a cushion with my beautiful baby boy and partner paying the major the bills, but before that homeless at 17, and these days I’m a single mum with SEN teen and I have cancer. Thems the breaks. Being on the cushion was fine and a shit load more comfortable than my current seat.
there’s staggering inequality when it comes to how hard life is and some people have it easy. I know them, they are my mates. they take me out for cake and tell me they feel awful about it 😂

Sorry to tell you but I feel no guilt or judgement having my husband currently cover our bills etc. why would I? We married and we have agreed to this together and can easily afford it. We live in a mortgage free house and if he lost his job we have savings and all of our parents could help bail us out if need be. I also have 2 degrees (soon to be 3) and professional qualifications so could get work if needs be.

I have faced my challenges but in a material sense my life is soft as marshmallows.

Why don’t you do it any more?

To me soft life is about loving yourself. Being kind to yourself. And this can be inexpensive like wearing slippers when you’re walking on cold floors, Taking time to give yourself a mini face massage to relax, telling yourself ‘it’s ok we all make mistakes’ when you get it wrong.
I don’t know why people have felt the need to start a trend which makes this soft life feel unavailable to others 😔

That's not what it means in social media terms, though, which is what the thread is about.

Can't think of anything worse tbh.

So yeah you're probably right.

But it will appeal to some, and some will enjoy it. Horses for courses.

I recently had to leave my job due to burnout. Fortunately DH's income currently covers our needs and I can afford to take things a bit easier for a while. It's been very hard for me to accept that I need to do this though because the messaging when I was growing up around being career focused and financially independent and constantly striving is what got me where I was mental health wise. I'm now sad that I went back to work earlier than was financially necessary after having our DC because I would have made other choices if I'd been more ok with accepting my DH's support instead of battling on. Maybe the current generation is trying to correct our mistakes and just going a bit too far in the other direction.