As a kid I hated being a girl. I thought it was way too complicated to be a girl. You had the weight of so many expectations, everyone had an opinion on how you should sit, eat, walk, talk. Not to mention the endless restrictions of what you could do or couldn’t. Needless to say I was a rebel, I hated the idea of anything feminine. It was weak, it was something people thought they could control, wrap in a tightly wrapped box. And, I was having none of it.
I stayed away from anything “girl-y” – barbies, plaits, the colour pink, playing kitchen. I liked cars, racing, a sporty bob cut, blue always, and playing anything but kitchen.
But a few things changed in the last few years.
Hello and welcome to another episode on the Being Meraklis Podcast. I’m your host and self awareness coach Shwetha Sivaraman and today am going to share some thoughts on women’s day and how women can truly empower themselves.
Like I mentioned in the introduction, I denied anything feminine in me as a child – I would be stone cold practical, rational, analytical. I’d look the other way from my emotions, pretend that weakness didn’t exist in me, valued strength in all the wrong ways.
But in the last many years, I’ve started embracing my feminity. I denied the divine feminine in me from expression for so long, that when I opened the doors, there was an overflowing realisation of just how wonderful it is to be a woman.
What came through many of these inquiries is being a woman is to be complex and many. Virginia Woolf says it best when she says, “It becomes clear that I’m not one and simple, but complex and many.” We contain multitudes – this is true for men too, but I feel women personify this more often.
We are fierce but gentle. We are strong but compassionate. We are firm but kind. We are creators and givers. We are natural nurturers, with infinite reserves of compassion, a sharp as knife intuition, more spiritually inclined than men. Menstruation can be a pain but it also keeps us connected to the cycles of the planet and moon. Keeping us connected, aligned, and more open to spiritual evolution.
We’ve got each other’s back. I’d be nothing without my girl tribe and I’m sure that’s the case for many of you women listening to me. Women get it, sorry men, no offense, but sometimes it takes a woman to understand another. And, there’s nothing like having your tribe of women with whom you can share things with confidence and receive unconditional support. There’s so much mutual support we can gain as women, to be a cheerleader and push our friends beyond their comfort zone and conquer what’s theirs to receiving strength, love, and support to pursue all our dreams.
Feminsim has got quite a bad rep today, and rightfully so. It’s not about one gender being preferred while the other suffers. Feminsim to me means equality. Equality to have the freedom to make choices that’s right for themselves. Equality in owning the consequences of one’s actions. Right now we are fighting for one without the other and that will only create more of an imbalance.
Equality doesn’t mean competing with men in physicality and strength. If that’s what you like then go for it, but that’s not what we say when we say equality. Equality doesn’t mean we shed our individualistic strengthes to be collectively average. Equality is to allow both genders to play to their individual strengths. Allowing both genders the same freedom, flexibility, consideration and most importantly, same consequences for bad actions. But more on that for another debate.
This women’s day, I wanted to share a message – 6 things – to all the women out there:
- Never lose your financial independence. Financial independence is the first step towards having your say and choice in your life. It offers you the freedom and the flexibility to do things you’d like without relying on others. Having some level of financial indepdence is crucial so you have some monetary backing to choose yourself at all times.
- You don’t have to justify your decisions to anyone. I’ve often felt guilt and try to justify my choices, whether I’m taking a week off for myself or signing up for a new course that doesn’t involve family, and I’ve seen many women do the same. You don’t have to justify your decisions and choices to anyone. Whether you want to be married or not, whether you want to have children or not, whether you want to do a course or not, you do not have to justify your choices to anyone else. Do what’s right for you when its right for you.
- Putting yourself first is not selfish. As women we are naturally givers, compassionate nurturers wanting to put others and their preferences first, and prioritising oursleves makes us feel guilty. I think most women I know spend 70% of their lives feeling guilty about something. Know that it’s okay to prioritise yourself. I’d say its not just okay, but necessary to prioritise yourself. You can’t pour from an empty cup. And the longer you put yourself last, the more resentful and angry you’ll get towards others who you prioritise before you, ruining the very relationships that matter most to you. Many women in their 40s are bitter and resentful to the very people who they love because they’ve compromised and compromised and lost what makes them them in the service of others needs and find themselves confused when time slips by and they’ve not achieved anything they desired.
You deserve to prioritise yourself every now and then. It’s not selfish to do that, it’s the only way to live life without guilt and resentment. If you need that me-time for yourself, take it every now and then, it’s necessary. 4. Ditch the shoulds start focusing on the wants. As women we are often at the receiving end of many unsolicited opinions. Everyone has an opinion on every aspect of our lives. What we should like, what clothes we should wear, when we should be married, when our biological clock is clicking, how we should wear our hair, whom we should marry, what kinds of careers we need to have, what we must sacrifice, the list is endless. Stop wasting away precious time in your life to meet these endless list of what and how a woman should be. Instead focus on the wants, what is it that you truly want to do? How would you want to spend this time in a way that’s meaningful for you. Dare to dream of a life that you truly desire and will make you happy. 5. Ask for help. We often hope people around us telepathically can understand what we need, but let’s face it, its impossible for others to know, especially when we hardly know what we want for ourselves. Instead of trying to do it all by ourselves, we need to get comfortable asking for help, from our spouses, siblings, parents and inlaws. Spell it out clearly, what is getting too much for you and have conversations on how you can ease the load on your plate to ensure you can keep going. 6. Increase your tolerance for difficult conversations. Women as a gender (and I’m generalising a bit), hesitate from confronting. We like our peace and prefer to sacrifice, compromise, bite our teeth and let go of disagreements for the greater good. But this doesn’t serve us in the long run. If you’re not okay with how things are going – at work, in relationships – prepare yourself to confront and have those unpleasant conversations. Shoving it under the rug will only make it worse for you in the longer run. Gradually increase your tolerance, have those tough confrontations, articulate clearly what your view is, stand your ground even when things get ugly (it does sometimes). Its okay.
Shakti means ‘power’ or ‘energy’ and is imagined as female. Shakti is a supreme being, created from the united power of all the gods, and is the energy behind the power of nature, of the wind, the oceans, of fire and the sun, and of life itself. She is the Divine Mother who also exemplifies the strength latent in every woman.
To be fierce yet gentle, strong yet compassionate, firm yet loving, powerful yet graceful, is to be a women. You’re not too sensitive, too weak, too thin or too fat, too naive or too shrewd. Shed these labels societies impose on us. You are you, and you can be wonderfully you without being too much or too less of something. Don’t be afraid to take up space and be unequivocally you.
Here’s hoping all you amazing women listening in embrace the softer and masculine parts in you with the same love, find that delicate balance, and celebrate the magic of being a women. And all the men listening in have the courage to be with women who are all of this and more.
Let’s channel that divine feminine within us every day and not just on women’s day, ask for what’s rightfully ours, and live up to the true power of a woman.
Until we meet again this is Shwetha signing off hoping you have a wonderful week ahead.