Empowering essence of a woman

Sucharita Banerjee *

Confident Woman in lap of nature

Woman are often regarded as care giver, nurturer who can smile and give courage to her children in midst of storm, they are strong with a soft heart. In nature, woman is often compared with moon, lamp, whereas male with sun and fire though all are source of light but moon is dependent on sun and lamp on fire to bring light to lives midst of darkness. 20th century woman has added more to this definition by being highly educated; economically independent, moving freely which was primarily man's privilege and domain.

We will try to analyze if this radical change in woman's life and society has really empowered or it had lead to a recession in woman's life? Is new found Independence is taking away the very essence of feminism from a woman forcing her to behave like man? Are we still projecting image of woman being strong only when she achieves her family or society laden targets.

These days girls since childhood are groomed to become beauty with brain to excel in life. Empowerment has moved our society to mentality where success is measured in terms of goal accomplishment. Whether its school / college of education, profession, salary, skill, position we have to be achieve the best. This continuous pressure of achievement has drained feminity out of woman.

In a survey release on woman's day woman from age of 30 have become to illness that used to strike females after 60 earlier. Hormonal imbalance is leading rise of cortisol, testosterone primarily a male hormone leading to cyst and cancers. Continuous sitting for desk job is increasing risk of diabetes, cardiac problem in 30's. Caffeine and processed food is actually causing depletion of many minerals which is essential for maintenance of healthy female cycle.

We don't produce required amount serotonin without help from sugar, chocolates or medicine. It is surprising to see depression is setting into female brain like plague. Centers of IVF clinics have mushroomed more than Mc Donald's outlet. Have we really got empowered or we are getting transformed into state of no return where our natural potential is getting altered.

Our society is accustomed of equating success with achievement and most of the society being patriarchal believes you are successful when you achieve like a man; career, property, networking etc. If one thinks of our grandmothers, they got married in teens, had 5-6 children, hardly much education, dependent on husband or son for survival. They groomed our mothers to get educated and groomed to support their husband when primary responsibility of earning for household stayed with male head. They dressed like females, sweet spoken yet head strong and good decision maker. Otherwise why would our grandfather and fathers would hand over all earning to their mother and wife if they were not good managers? No doubt there were cases of wife beating and torture in last two generations but proportion was much less due family pressure.

Our generation is witnessing radical changes than last two. Woman today are witnessing self-sufficiency, higher education, career, outside exposure beyond imagination of last two generations of woman but simultaneously horrible rapes, murder, extramarital affairs, divorces, denial of equal work equal pay. It seems somewhere man is feeling threatened due to achievement of female and want to exercise their superiority by any mean. In a way woman's life is facing recession in physical and psychological aspects. In such a scenario how we shall groom our daughter to become an empowered woman of next decade.

Should they keep on silently sacrifice or fulfill their wishes. How parents and society can work together to groom them into physically and mentally strong woman?

The day a soul is born as human, we start making her agenda of life, which I feel is insult to soul. We often tell babies if you love your mom and dad do this and that and make us feel proud; this puts unnecessary pressure on brain and life solely made to achieve goals until death. Female baby needs different grooming than male baby. They need more assurance, attention to stand up, explore surrounding whereas male baby needs motivation for target achievement.

For example, when child starts walking and stumble female baby will cry and look for presence of her mother within her sight range motivating her to stand up but male baby will focus for comfort in his mother's lap which he will achieve only when he stands up. Both will stand up but motivation will be different for both as psychological need for both is different so should be grooming. Even in corporate world when woman is made to compete with her male colleagues, she has to work overtime, go through cut throat competition and stress that drains her energy, since she has to leave her home and kids behind, after a time guilt starts encompassing her mind. If there is an important meeting no woman can take leave on pretext of ill child or old parent at home.

It's true that company pays for getting work done but at times struggle is really hard between a mother and an employee and most often employee wins due to lack of jobs in market. Though some big companies are adapting themselves to retain their female staff even but no. is really less. Many a time women have to leave her job to take care of family duties as very few companies allow work from home.

It will take change in mentality of family, society corporate world to develop a woman who is valuable to family and company together. I don't feel females can be empowered by making them dress, talk and behave like men, as they are engineered by nature to be owner of powerful energy with numerous talents, if we develop their talent and skills and make them confident about themselves we don't t really have to pressurize our girls to hit targets.

With support of society when they are motivated to focus on giving their best shot rather than winning first prize obviously they will perform well. We need to make them realize their true potential to empower them.