Personal Visions for collective betterment!

When it is over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.
I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.\" — Mary Oliver

While going through a session of recapitulation this week, evaluating my accomplishments, failures and learnings, I wondered where my journey to think ‘beyond me’ started. My personal vision coincides with my work; design innovative and ground-breaking solutions for the uplift of under-privileged women living in destitute, suffering, poverty, dependence, solitude or shame. Most of these women are main providers or nurturers who get up very early in the morning to pluck cotton from the cotton fields or harvest crops but despite being the vital and basic building block which is pivotal of patriarchal society, they do not get half of the dignity and respect they deserve. I started designing programs and projects specifically targeting the need-based solutions to issues faced by these women and during my 7 years in development sector and managed to work on over 16 proposals via different platforms and organizations for the betterment of depressed youth and women.

A year ago, my life and work coming to a halt when I refused to marry someone of my family’s choice which raised eye-brows of many men…was accused of becoming independent. seemed to have lost my sense of direction, sinking deeply in depression and despair surrounded by a strong feeling that all my past efforts are in vain. During these challenges times, it was very difficult for me to find a platform to share problems and their possible solutions with women who were working for similar cause.

I plan to continue my work in being a change agent, and I also plan to continue writing about the things I see, observe and feel. I sometimes feel I have lost all my words, my year long silence choked me…the lack of firm sense of belonging feels like stealing all the colours from my life. Through PulseWire community, and reading the stories from all corners of the world, I woke up to the reality there are women living in a lot more destitute and inhumane conditions than us, but still facing tougher challenges with tremendous amount of courage and unmatched zeal…women leaders are born even in places where women are treated like property and these stories proved to be a catalyst for me to keep fighting. The pool of talented and brave women of PulseWire community inspired me to wake up from my year long hibernation and writers’ block.

Reading all those stories made me realize that we should never let any incident in life control or alter our broader purpose of existence and I am glad to have found ‘listeners’ through this emerging bloggers’ community. I am not alone anymore!

I am thankful to Pulsewire women’s blogosphere for giving me the confidence to finally do the first write-up for my blog that I have been meaning to do for ages for the blog I registered over a year ago! I started with becoming the voice of Christian nursing school principal, Ms.Victoria Anita, who was targeted by her students due to her faith. The local media did not cover her story. I am proud to become the sound of a marginalized voice that wandered helplessly around me. It is empowering to empower! It gave me incredible satisfaction, sense of hope and inspiration seeing how a woman of a religious minority in Pakistan was fighting for her rights and refused to give in at the face of religious extremist elements.

Some day, I hope to compile all my work and writings and share it with social entrepreneurs at the beginners’ level. I am positive that my engagement with VOF will help me polish my writing skills and build my capacity in learning techniques to write boldly and openly while avoiding the worst mistakes a writer can make. I do not know if I will be one of the finalists, but I feel I have woken up from a long slumber and am ready for a fresh start, knowing, I now have friends all over the world, who are actually listening to me! This feeling of wakefulness, sharing and emotional caressing is more than what I can ask for!