The ability to choose is so deeply ingrained in us that we often overlook how powerful it can be.
Beyond the usual exaltations of women and their achievements, the International Women’s Day movement has provided us with an impetus to break barriers and level the playing field.
The recent Nobel Prize Laureate in Economics Prof. Claudia Goldin in 2023 whose foundational research on women’s participation in the workforce shed phenomenal light on the fundamental challenges of women balancing their career and family across generations. Women are most notably extolled for their self-sacrificing role as a nurturing caregiver. However, there is also a long legacy of women who made irrefutable contributions in their respective domains, paving the way to bigger and greater technology than what we have in the past.
Women like Mdm Marie Curie, who discovered the elements polonium and radium, or American inventor Emma Lilian Todd, who was recognised as the first woman to design and build an airplane even though she had never sat in one before, were the true trailblazers who broke the glass ceiling and even revolutionised the way in which we live.
Women are equally capable in their own rights. But the deeper challenge is to establish an inherent belief in a woman’s abilities so that future generations can realise their potential on the same level playing field without any prejudice, stereotypes, or stigma.
Regardless of the choices we make or the path we choose, the fact that we have the ability to choose is power itself. The liberty to shape our destiny is power itself, and that itself is a cause for celebration.
On this International Women’s Day, we #celebratechoices, featuring some inspirational students or parents who, regardless of the challenges and even in the face of adversity, have chosen to walk the path they have set themselves up for with unflinching courage and unstinting devotion.
