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| Image source: ResonationID |
Women Empowerment Conference. Something that is commonly held in developed countries but unfortunately is not common in Indonesia.
I had the opportunity to attend Resonation: Women Empowerment Conference last Saturday in The Kasablanka. This one-day seminar is the first women empowerment conference in Indonesia. With Sophia Amoruso, founder and the original #GIRLBOSS as main speaker, Resonation challenges women in Indonesia with this question: "What's Stopping You?"
Being a woman is not easy. There are so many barriers that retain us to be whoever we want to be. Especially in Indonesia, or Asia in general, where culture, traditions, and religions are heavily presence in our daily lives. Resonation challenge us to determine what's stopping us women from achieving our dreams, as we learned from the amazing speakers of what's stopping them and how they overcame their barriers.
I didn't go to all session, but I'm gonna write about the 3 sessions I went to.
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| Sophia Amoruso of #GIRLBOSS as main speaker, image source: GoGirl! |
1. Sophia Amoruso — Founder of Nasty Gal & #GIRLBOSS Media
I couldn't agree more with her statement. Don't lower down your level because of other people, Ladies.
2. Nina Moran — Founder of Resonation, CEO of GoGirl! Magazine
Nina Moran's session is definitely my favorite. Being the CEO of GoGirl! Magazine, she was named Entrepreneurial Winning Woman by Ernst & Young in 2013.
Her topic for that afternoon session is about failure. She said that society glorifies success so much, people start to think that it's a sin to fail. Especially in the modern times like now with social media, where we can instantly see our friends & relatives success story in real time. It's good to get this kind of reminder, that everything we see in social media is curated. We can only see the good things that happened in other people's lives, but not their failures.
She told us her personal story about failure when GoGirl was in huge debt due to miscalculation in taxation. Because in Indonesia, taxation failure is Pidana (crime) and not Perdata (court of justice), she was almost arrested and sent behind bars because she couldn't pay up her company's debt.
Worse, that happened when she was heavily pregnant with her third child. She was in such big debt that once, her company's bank account balance was only IDR12,000/SGD1.50. She couldn't even afford to pay for her youngest daughter's education, and for a while the little girl couldn't go to school. She said that her daughter hugged her and said, "Mommy, I really want to go to school". It broke her heart and all of us who was listening to her story.
Moran said that her realization about failure at that point of time was, even when she already hit rock bottom, she was still alive. I think, failures can only get you that far, but we're so much stronger than that. Failure happens, but we're designed to be able to handle that and eventually bounce back from that chasm.
When people talked of how successful she was, Moran said that she felt like she was a fraud because then she got in such huge debt. I can totally relate to her. Sometimes, there is a voice in my head that says I'm a fraud, that I know absolutely nothing and it's only a matter of time before people find out how I'm such a fraud. It may sounds terrible, but hearing successful people like Moran also feel that way, it kinda assures me that I'm doing okay, if you get what I mean? Haha.
Her session really touched my heart, because I have always been scared of failures. I have always set certain goals and tick boxes that I need to check by certain age, and it makes me scared AF if I couldn't check those boxes in time. One lesson I got from this seminar is, if you think certain people already got their life all figured out, they're not. We just need to try our best to live and learn.
Another memorable topic during Moran's session is when an audience said that her parents are against her achieving her dream, and her mom even said that she won't be proud of her if she keeps doing her passion instead of what her parents told her to do. Moran said that her advice for the audience is to talk to her mum and said,
Anyway, I think this session is really the most inspiring and empowering one for me. I really admire her session because of her honesty and there is a sense of nakedness in what she said. Not everyone can talk about their failures, let alone talk about it in front of hundred people on a stage.
3. Men Panel With Ashraf Sinclair, Henry Manampiring, & Johan Ekengård
The last session was the men panel. Three men were invited to talk about women empowerment and answered questions from the audience. There are some memorable questions in my opinion:
1. How would you feel if your wives have bigger income or have more successful career than you?
This is my longest blog post so far haha. Please remember that this is my personal opinion, everyone's entitled to freedom of speech as long as it's not bashing right? I know I've talked about sensitive issue like feminism, gender equality, and parenting style in here, but please remember that it's just my personal opinion and I don't mean to offend anyone.
Being the founder and the original #GIRLBOSS, it's not really a surprise to see Sophia Amoruso in a women empowerment conference. I was so excited to see her keynote session, in fact, it's actually what made me purchase the ticket on the first place.
However, I must say that the keynote session wasn't as thought-provoking as I thought it would be. It could be because I didn't manage my expectation well too haha. But honestly speaking, most of the things she said during the keynote can be found in her book #GIRLBOSS.
I'm not saying that her session was bad, it's just that I thought there's gonna be more new topics rather than what's already in her book. I was actually hoping she would make a remark or two of how she handled stuff when Nasty Gal declared bankruptcy recently. I know she already resigned from her position as Nasty Gal Executive Chairwoman when the bankruptcy happened, but it would be interesting to see her thoughts and feelings about that. After all Nasty Gal is her first baby before #GIRLBOSS Media.
My most favorite part in her keynote is when she talked about relationship, how a #GIRLBOSS would handle romantic relationship without compromising her achieving her dreams. An audience asked, what would be Sophia's advice for #GIRLBOSS out there whose barrier in achieving their dreams are in fact, their husbands or boyfriends?
Her advice is very memorable to me: "Find someone who gets turned on by your ambition."
I couldn't agree more with her statement. Don't lower down your level because of other people, Ladies.
2. Nina Moran — Founder of Resonation, CEO of GoGirl! Magazine
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| Nina Moran during her session: Your Test Into Testimony, image source: ResonationID |
Her topic for that afternoon session is about failure. She said that society glorifies success so much, people start to think that it's a sin to fail. Especially in the modern times like now with social media, where we can instantly see our friends & relatives success story in real time. It's good to get this kind of reminder, that everything we see in social media is curated. We can only see the good things that happened in other people's lives, but not their failures.
She told us her personal story about failure when GoGirl was in huge debt due to miscalculation in taxation. Because in Indonesia, taxation failure is Pidana (crime) and not Perdata (court of justice), she was almost arrested and sent behind bars because she couldn't pay up her company's debt.
Worse, that happened when she was heavily pregnant with her third child. She was in such big debt that once, her company's bank account balance was only IDR12,000/SGD1.50. She couldn't even afford to pay for her youngest daughter's education, and for a while the little girl couldn't go to school. She said that her daughter hugged her and said, "Mommy, I really want to go to school". It broke her heart and all of us who was listening to her story.
Moran said that her realization about failure at that point of time was, even when she already hit rock bottom, she was still alive. I think, failures can only get you that far, but we're so much stronger than that. Failure happens, but we're designed to be able to handle that and eventually bounce back from that chasm.
When people talked of how successful she was, Moran said that she felt like she was a fraud because then she got in such huge debt. I can totally relate to her. Sometimes, there is a voice in my head that says I'm a fraud, that I know absolutely nothing and it's only a matter of time before people find out how I'm such a fraud. It may sounds terrible, but hearing successful people like Moran also feel that way, it kinda assures me that I'm doing okay, if you get what I mean? Haha.
Her session really touched my heart, because I have always been scared of failures. I have always set certain goals and tick boxes that I need to check by certain age, and it makes me scared AF if I couldn't check those boxes in time. One lesson I got from this seminar is, if you think certain people already got their life all figured out, they're not. We just need to try our best to live and learn.
Another memorable topic during Moran's session is when an audience said that her parents are against her achieving her dream, and her mom even said that she won't be proud of her if she keeps doing her passion instead of what her parents told her to do. Moran said that her advice for the audience is to talk to her mum and said,
"Mom, you're my mother and you mean the world to me. But this is my life, and I have decided what I want to do with it. It's hurtful for me to hear what you said, because as your child I want to make you proud, but I want to do what I'm passionate about too."Sigh. I think parents just want what's best for us, but sometimes they forget that we're already adults and have to start living our own lives according to what we want and take full responsibility for it.
Anyway, I think this session is really the most inspiring and empowering one for me. I really admire her session because of her honesty and there is a sense of nakedness in what she said. Not everyone can talk about their failures, let alone talk about it in front of hundred people on a stage.
3. Men Panel With Ashraf Sinclair, Henry Manampiring, & Johan Ekengård
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| Men Panel, image source: ResonationID |
1. How would you feel if your wives have bigger income or have more successful career than you?
- The men think that it's actually not a $$$ issue, but more of how you communicate each other's role in a relationship. I think at the end of the day, being respectful towards your partner regardless of how big their income or your income is is way more important.
2. When Ashraf came up to the stage, the first thing he said is, "Good afternoon, beautiful Ladies." An audience asked, why he said "beautiful ladies" instead of "smart ladies"?
- It took all of us by surprise when the woman asked this question. She said that small things like that is why women often subconsciously think that they're lesser than men. However, Ashraf said that beautiful is not a bad word, and it's more of a culture/tradition thing of why people associate women to be beautiful. However, Ashraf admitted him being insensitive and thanked the woman for correcting him.
In this question, I must agree with Ashraf. I really think it's not a problem when a man greets women with the word beautiful as long as it's in an appropriate way (inappropriate way example: catcall. That's more insulting rather than complimenting).
Some more, beauty is something you immediately can decide ("oh this person is beautiful"), being smart on the other hand, you can't expect everyone to be smart. You have to earn it. That's the thing with overly feminist women that I need to disagree with. Just because you're a woman doesn't mean you're entitled to something that even men need to earn, be it in workforce or life. I wouldn't call myself a feminist if that's the case. I think rather than feminism, I'd support gender equality more.
3. What kind of woman do you find annoying?
- Henry Manampiring's answer takes the cake in my opinion. He said that for him, there is no such thing as annoying women and good women, only annoying people or good people. Sometimes, it's not always a gender-related issue. Again, I'd bring back my previous point: gender equality instead of feminism and/or men-bashing!
To conclude, I'm glad I went to this conference, it was thought-provoking & inspiring, and I spent a good Saturday with my like-minded girlfriends. A Saturday well spent indeed!
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| Couldn't agree more with this. Image source: Pinterest |
Thanks for visiting & reading, Loves, talk to you soon 😘
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