I Refuse to Choose
Family or Career has always been a battle for
everyone, but more so for a woman. She was born in Rajasthan, a place where
even now most women are expected to be only homemakers and have the ‘ghoonghat’
tradition. But she was destined for a lot more and she worked for it. She
acquired the Masters Degree in Management Studies from Jamnalal Bajaj Institute
of Management Studies, Mumbai. She received the Wockhardt Gold Medal for
Excellence in Management Studies as well as the J. N. Bose Gold Medal in Cost
Accountancy for highest marks in the same year. She is married to a wind energy
entrepreneur and has two children, a son and a daughter. But she is also the
Managing Director of India's largest private bank and overall second largest
bank in the country. She is Chanda Kochar.
A couple of weeks back I was watching a movie,
a biopic. Frankly, I am not a fan of the movie but have immense respect for the
person on whose life the movie was based. Resistance from family, available
trainers and locals, but she never backed out. She started competing for state
level boxing games; went on to win the state and national level championships
and then her first international game - Asian Women's Boxing Championship. The
resistance slowly changed to praises. At
the peak of her career – three successive gold medals at the AIBA Women's World
Boxing Championship – she decided to
get married and the battle started again. This was for choosing family over
career. But that wasn’t true, that was just the lack of faith people had and
the age old wiring people have that a woman cannot handle both career and
family meticulously at the same time. She is now India’s top female boxer, one
of world’s finest, but is also a mother and a wife. This is the AND story of
Mary Kom and not an OR story.
Wondering why suddenly I am talking about these
woman and their AND stories?
Life is a battle of ORs and ANDs. Everyone has
to make choices at a certain point of time. Men and women are all stuck in a
game of Jenga(life) with blocks that have a lot of Ors and hardly any ANDs. But
the worst part is women are expected to not get the ANDs blocks. I am not
trying to sound like a feminist here, because I am not one; but the fact is, even
though men and women both have to make compromises and ‘choose between’ things,
women are expected to make them willingly. It is not wrong to say women are
expected to be born with a compromising attitude. And if a woman decides to do
everything people start doubting her capability and commitment. But the truth
is – Women can be awesome at multitasking if the decide to. One of my neighbors
is groom-hunting these days, and she told me the most recurring requirement
from the suitors so far has been that she should be ready to leave her job and
become a house wife. Don’t you think to choose between small and simple pleasures of life
is a punishment? And to be expected to do so because of your gender is just
unacceptable.
A woman is judged on the basis of the small
things like nail polish and lipstick to things like career. A girl is
stereotyped as either beauty or brain and if in case the two come together, her
capabilities are subjected to doubts and random tests. A girl is believed to like
a game like football or cricket only for good looking players, and if she says
it is the sport and not some sportsperson, ‘prove it tests’ just never end. It
is like, breaking the stereotype is a constant test and no one should have to
prove such small things to anyone.
As a child I had to choose between a lot of
things – small things but never insignificant. For instance, academics or
co-curricular activities? Every child these days goes through this because of
the rat race that is so rampant! And for a kid like me – I loved singing,
dancing, sports, debates and quizzes – not only my parents but even my
professors were concerned I would fail my academics because of the ‘extra
stuff’. One of my professors had also told me once to not focus on sports, and
to rather study harder as girls in sports in India are not very successful! I
refused to give up and continued playing. Yes, I didn’t become a professional
player but I turned out to be pretty ok, I guess. Now I am an engineer and work
in one of the Big Four Companies, I haven’t stopped singing, I am still
passionate about sports and not only follow tennis AND football religiously, I
play table tennis whenever my schedule permits; AND I am a travel AND poetry
blogger. Recently I got published in an anthology and am going to be published
in another. I also travelled to Malaysia and got a chance to attend the Merdeka
Day celebrations at the Merdeka Square with other foreign delegates. I am
career oriented, but I don’t let go of my family, my hobbies, and my passion! I
didn’t choose; I refused to choose because I knew I could do it and I refuse to
chose in future too because I can do what I decide to do. I am not the best at
any yet, but I aspire to be better at all and I know I can.
Me with my fellow bloggers Manjulika and Ragini in Malaysia
All I want to say is, life doesn’t really have
to be constant struggle of ORs and ANDs and women need to step out of the box
called social norms and breathe in the fresh air of change.
Fire within and fiery you
Kind within and loving you
You are Beauty and Brains
You dare and you care
Beautiful and Bold, Smart and Strong
You can be all, and that is not wrong
Be the force, be the calm
For like water you are, don’t be bridged by a
dam
Remember who you are and who you can
You are a woman, you are a woman!
Enjoyed reading about these inspiring women. Good luck for the contest! :)
ReplyDeleteThank you so much :)
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