With more than 100 guests from different parts of the world, a deep meaningful and impactful discussion was curated with a terrific panel of two strong empowering female leaders— Dr. Rubana Huq, Vice Chancellor of Asian University For Women and President of BMGEA; Morgan Williams, Head of the People and Culture, The Newsette.
Academic and financial empowerment will be effective when the elements of courage, confidence, self-respect, self-dignity and self-love are exercised simultaneously. It is our responsibility to create a network and/or a community to promote, respect and encourage each other. It is our responsibility to help women and young girls to navigate life by teaching them to self-love, respect, dignify; by guiding them to grow confidence and courage! It is on us to hold the light for them to enable them to lead the path for the rest! And that’s why WHAT NO ONE EVER TAUGHT ME was organised!
“What No One Ever Taught Me” was a depiction of inspirations and impacts as the guests shared their virtues and core-experiences regarding courage, confidence, self-respect, self-dignity and self-love. Our discussion started by taking our guests to their young ages and learning from them how these elements played a role in shaping them to adulthood. Morgan shared how she was different from others and embraced the differences in life. Rejections will be common to every chapter of life but sticking to our goals are our main cores in every story, she added!
Dr.Rubana Huq opined that courage is primarily rooted in us by our families and specially by our mothers. However, it is also important to perform individual due exercises in identifying one’s own strengths and interests, to sculpt courage. Humbleness and courageousness are correlated and core determinants of lives, she underscored.
The guests further delineated the difference between confidence and humility by sharing great examples from their lives. “Confidence” is intrinsic; internally grown and “Humility” can be both internally and externally developed. It is the glue that connects us to each other and allows us to be more humble, kind and confident!
According to Dr.Huq, the blending of knowledge and humbleness strengthen confidence. Providing encouragement, preparing youths, especially female children, for life is part of our communal responsibility, she expressed. One can’t be perceived as confident unless they demonstrate the core elements of confidence – humility and knowledge. She emphasised the young generation on learning – learning from every corner of their lives; learning from each other; learning that confidence is making others feel inspired and comfortable in their presence.
“Role of confidence in the period of adolescence” was also a discussion topic, where Dr. Huq upheld the important role of adults here. She underscored that adults should go forward to offer adolescents the network of comfort. Adults should guide and coach them with the right knowledge, exposure and resources when adolescents are struggling with confidence. She appreciated Bold and Becoming for offering such exposures to the youths and encouraged others to lean into such resources for inspiration.
As a community and as an individual, we can do so much to drive more confidence and to help each person to become and be their best. Self-awareness is one of the first steps in this journey. We need to remind ourselves and others that confidence can not be produced overnight, it is built gradually with practice. Our positive actions and related supports are our main nourishments for growing gradual confidence; and to inspire others to grow theirs. We need to share ours and know others’ stories and interests and support them physically and mentally to grow as a confident individual and a confident community. These can be done through one-one mentorship programmes, guided entrepreneurship, sharing experiences etc. Practising these can help others to acquire more confidence and to achieve their dreams!
To the question of how we can cultivate self-love in order to build confidence, the guests cohered to a common important value of loving and taking care of own-selves.If we don’t love and take care of ourselves,we won’t be able to amplify these for others around us. As such, self love has an important role in building confidence. Self-love should translate to learning to take breaks, learning to surround and engage in positive activities and communities; learning to acknowledge and care for mental health. However, caution should be maintained to not become self absorbed in the process of self-love!
And, with that we ended our first event: “WHAT NO ONE EVER TAUGHT ME”. We cordially thank one of our Bold and Becoming advisors, Jasmine Ahmed(Mahbubul Alam) the Global Director-Head of Finance Innovation, WPP, for her generosity in sharing her time, guidance and in co-facilitating and weaving this conversation to be more effective, inclusive and impactful!
We appreciate everyone who is carrying the light forward with us! WHAT NO ONE EVER TAUGHT ME is a story of each of us! A story shared by all the girls!
