Whole Woman Anniversary

What is this and who can celebrate it? This anniversary marks a milestone in a woman’s life—a moment that led to a significant change in our journeys like the day you decided to go for higher education, or to take up a job, or start a business, or change of career path, or deciding to become a homemaker, come out as queer, or adopt, or decide to love someone, or to give birth to a child or a project, saying no to domestic violence, or emotionally triumphing over abuse, protesting a harassment, resisting any form of power structures—all such moments that contribute in discovering or awakening wholeness in ourselves.

Any woman, whether she is married, single, divorced, separated, widowed, queer, in between stuff, irrespective of her class, caste, social status or profession can celebrate it.

Why celebrate it? Because we seem to celebrate occasions that at some level excludes others and privileges the presence of a man—we celebrate engagement, marriage, marriage anniversary, pregnancy, birth of a child, his/her first time sitting/standing/eating solid food, first birthday, every birthday thereafter, graduation from nursery to every other upper class and so on and so forth. Nothing wrong with it. We should celebrate such life moments. Except they tend to celebrate in the shadow of a man’s/family’s presence. Don’t get me wrong—man isn’t bad or evil nor is family. But we don’t seem to have a space where we celebrate ourselves. We don’t have a space to celebrate moments that we give to ourselves, to honour the decisions we make, the successes we achieve personally, emotionally, psychologically. This celebration includes women regardless of their marital status, their child-bearing abilities, their professional choices, their abilities or social status. By this, we redefine our paths and find community as women. Not in exclusion to men or family. But as a space that co-exists with other spaces.

Why celebrate? I know several would criticize that celebration at some level invokes class structures. I agree. There is danger in that. At some level, this is elitist; the poor often do not have the privilege to celebrate anything more than a marriage or a festival. However, making these moments invisible is not a way out either. Sometimes one size does not fit all. I remain a big believer in rituals to mark and honour transitory moments and I believe there is a reason why we find celebration rituals in many traditions. Celebration is celebrating life on earth, getting a sense of where we are going, to self-power ourselves to continue on that journey or modify it, if needed.

How can we celebrate? Any which way you want. For myself, I would like to be careful that whatever I do does not exploit human or natural resources, but in some way or form contributes and shares the joy with others.

Wishing each and every one of you a joyful path to wholeness! I celebrate mine today--the day I decided to walk out alone.