Womanhood is you. Womanhood is everything that’s inside of you.
- Viola Davis
I often ponder about what it means to be a woman.
What does it mean to be a woman? Is womanhood defined by our organs (upon which society, the media, culture are so fixated)? Is it being able to menstruate? Is it about whether we can be biological mother and can produce children? Are there some women who are “more woman” than others? Society advocates that being a woman involves having the “right biological parts”. Is this really true womanhood?
If I was bestowed with the honor to answer this, I would say that for me being a woman is an individual’s state of mind and most importantly, a personal choice. It is the commitment to social action and freedom of sheer expression. It certainly isn’t limited to biology. If we choose to tread upon the path of tracing all the way back to our mythological roots, we would stumble across the beautifully curated concept of Ardhanareeshvara which is a combination of three words; “Ardha,” “Nari,” and “Ishwara” means “half,” “woman,” and “lord,” respectively, which when combined means the lord whose half is a woman. The Ardhanareeshvara symbolizes male and female principles cannot be separated and emphasizes the fact that femininity is an energy that isn’t concurrent only to the absence or presence of certain biological parts.
Transgender women, two spirits, androgynous women, bi-gender women, demi girls, folks that identify with the pronouns she/they, etc. are women in the utmost sense. It will be absolutely right to state that debating upon who gets “womaned” by society is subjected entirely to misogynistic discrimination. Valiant women like Lakshmi Narayan Tripathi have fought for years for transgender rights and to acknowledge their courageous paths would be the least we should do. In recent times, even pop culture references can be made to illustrate how the line between traditional norms of masculinity and femininity is fading away and that every person has the innate right to choose for themselves. Rather than staying stubbornly clinched to biological fundamentalisms, we should instead embrace a rainbow of possibilities between the familiar pink and blue spectrums of gender.
Womanhood is embracing our differences, flairs, freckled varied experiences, and personal preferences. Being a woman encompasses love and belief in oneself, strength, benevolence, and fearlessness. This is womanhood in an absolute sense, a force to be reckoned with.
This thoughtful piece has been curated by Ms. Akshiti Chauhan.