I have come to realize making yourself happy is most important. Never be ashamed of how you feel. You have the right to feel any emotion you want, and do what makes you happy. That’s my life motto. — Demi Lovato
Most people already know without even looking at statistics that women earn less money than men, and that women have fewer employment and advancement opportunities (despite the fact more women hold higher degrees than men). Along with that, 8 in 10 single parent families being headed by women, it is women who have to balance the dual roles of work and parenting – not men.
Keeping this in mind, The Mind Research Foundation in collaboration with Rotary had the opportunity to conduct a session with women working in Evry, an IT company in Mohali in order to maintain as well as reinvigorate that essence of being a working women. The topic taken up was “Work-Life Balance: A Modern Women’s Dilemma” The main theme was to address the concerns encountered by the working women in their day to day lives and providing them small life hacks in order to overcome the same.
The session was conducted on 4th September, 2017 at Industrial Area, Landmark Plaza, F3 Towers, Spe,Mohali, Punjab. It was a 25 minute interactive talk with the group of 60 women and top management executives.
The main areas covered were:
• Hamster on the Treadmill: Balancing or not?
• Cost of Balancing:
1. Role Conflict
2. Role Overload
• Stating the Facts
• Work and Home Stress:
1. Burnout
2. Mental Load
• Personality Traits an Risk Factors
1. Type A
2. Type B
3. Other Risk Factors
• Let’s see the Mirror: Forgetting oneself in the Rat race
1. Embracing ‘I’
• Mindfulness: The Magical Wand
• Changing the Paradigm
Work-life balance is just one more task for women to try and find time to tend to; one more thing on their long to do list to fail and feel bad about not accomplishing in a day.
Letting go of the old perspectives and bringing a change in reality by creating new paradigms were discussed. Mindfulness was introduced which would further help them in creating a better present and an authentic new self.
The overall feedback was beyond satisfactory which was evident through the ‘I know what you are talking about’ nods, wide smiles, enlightened faces of women and gratitude of the organisation. Keeping in view the active participation, we feel that there is ample scope and need to spread awareness on such topics.
This is a small step taken by the Mind Research Foundation in the Tricity region where Women needs are being addressed. We look forward to organizing similar events in the future with a hope to create constructive dialogue and a brighter future.