Women have lower self-esteem than men? || Acharya Prashant, at AIIMS Nagpur (2022)

Acharya Prashant

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Transcript

00:00Let me share an incident from our class. In relation to gender class, we performed a self-esteem

00:08analysis test. And B, having one of the toughest exams, the results came out that boys have

00:17much higher self-esteem than girls. So if that's the case with us, what will be the

00:23case with the women of the rural areas and those straight on?

00:27You see, let's see. What you are saying is, you have encountered a paradox. Now a

00:34paradox really cannot exist. What you are saying is, all your batch mates have cleared

00:41a very tough entrance exam, but the males have much higher self-esteem, as measured

00:50in some test, compared to the women that have a lower, comparatively, self-esteem.

00:58So what's your hypothesis here? Can you investigate? Your hypothesis is, clearing the exam will

01:04give you high self-esteem. That's your hypothesis. And because the hypothesis is being invalidated

01:09here, so you are puzzled. You are asking, how is it happening? Now obviously, if the

01:14facts don't agree with the hypothesis, there is something wrong with the hypothesis, not

01:22the fact. If you have measured facts correctly, if your test was properly administered, and

01:29if really the girls have comparatively lower self-esteem, then that's a fact. The hypothesis

01:38that clearing an entrance exam would make you feel better about yourself, stands invalidated.

01:44Now why does it stand invalidated? There is a reason. Look at Prakriti. You understand

01:51Prakriti, we are talking of mother nature. We are talking of the thing that gives rise

01:56to our bodies. We are talking of that. That's Prakriti. Look at Prakriti. What is the role

02:04that Prakriti has assigned you? You are saying, I did something and therefore I have higher

02:11esteem. I did something, so I have higher self-esteem. Now if I assign you the role

02:23to fetch vegetables from market, both of you, and instead you fetch something else,

02:34let's say diamonds. She fetches vegetables. Both of you have gone to the market and done

02:41something. But have you done what I asked you to do? Therefore in front of me, you will

02:49not feel very confident. You have done something great. You have fetched diamonds from the

02:55market but you have not done what you were supposed to do. Now what are you supposed

03:01to do in the scheme of mother nature as a woman? Please tell me. What does mother nature

03:08want you to do as a woman? Look at the jungle again. She wants you to reproduce. That's

03:17all. She wants the DNA to be proliferated as much as possible. Now you might have done

03:24a great job in cracking the entrance exam but you have not done what she wanted you

03:28to do. Therefore you don't feel good about yourself and you won't even know why you don't

03:32feel good about yourself. Because inwardly, in your consciousness, you are still carrying

03:39her mandate. His mandate is to go out and succeed in the world. So when he does go out

03:46and succeeds in the world, he feels very fulfilled and that's the story of a lot of

03:51accomplished women in the world. Even if they are very successful professionally, a kind

04:00of a void remains within and they don't even know why. Often I meet them, they discuss

04:06this with me and this is the reason. The reason is as long as you continue to identify with

04:13your physical self, you will continue to be burdened with the mandate of your physical

04:19self and the mandate of your physical self is not that you become intellectually great.

04:24That's not what mother nature wants you to do. She wants you to nicely settle down in

04:29a nest and have babies. Now how will then doing even the greatest job in the world contribute

04:38to your self-esteem, if you have not done what she wants you to do? The only way then

04:45to feel fulfilled and self-assured is to disown the job she has given you and she has given

04:52you, I repeat, a very animalistic job. Do you want to continue living by her instructions?

05:00That's my request and question to all men and women present here. You know, to the extent,

05:08that if you do not do her bidding, if you do not live by her instructions, she gives

05:13you physical diseases. You are medical students, you might be knowing it better than I do.

05:22Women who choose not to live by their biological mandate are more prone to certain reproductive

05:29diseases. That's the punishment that she gives you, if you do not do what she has sent you

05:37to do and she has not sent you to feel fulfilled or feel liberated or be enlightened in life.

05:45Prakriti does not want any kind of fulfillment or liberation or enlightenment for you. All

05:49she wants from you is kids and lots of them. Do that and Prakriti is happy. Even if you

05:54remain very dumb all your life, but produce a lot of babies, Prakriti is happy. But if

06:03you go the way of consciousness as you must, then there are hurdles. I can only say that

06:11it's worth taking up those challenges, it's worth fighting those hurdles. Are you getting it?

06:19I have seen this repeatedly and it hurts me no end. In my time, we had a batch of 350

06:30students at IIT Delhi, only 13 were girls and some of them had really good JEE ranks.

06:39In fact most of them had better JEE ranks than me. But just as you mentioned right now,

06:47the confidence levels, the level of self-assurance was lower in them compared to their male batchmates.

06:58The reason is the same. You might have accomplished much, but both your body and the society,

07:06what is the question they ask of you? The question is, when are you going to settle?

07:12Beta aage ka kya socha hai? Now she might be a JEE topper, she might be a medical entrance

07:18topper, but that's what both of these ask her. Her body, her body and the society. This

07:27is the question that awaits her at every turn. When are you going to get settled and

07:33after she gets settled, when are you going to have babies? So how can she feel fulfilled

07:40or complete or confident just by clearing an entrance exam? Clearing an entrance exam

07:46is just 10% of her job according to Prakriti. Prakriti says 90% of your job lies somewhere

07:53else, it lies in the nest and if you are a failure in the nest, then irrespective of

07:58your professional or academic or intellectual accomplishments, you are a failure. Do you

08:04want to buy this definition? Do you want to buy this criteria? If you buy this criteria,

08:12then I am afraid you can't live a fulfilled life, especially as a woman. I am grateful

08:24for the first presentation that there was and it added to my knowledge because several

08:29of the big names that you displayed there, I didn't know of them, especially the ones

08:34from medical science field. But the ones that I knew of, several of them, I know for sure,

08:43you read their biographies, they were not well received by the society either throughout

08:51their life or at several points in their lives. Marie Curie is one such name. We know of her

09:01intellectual and professional accomplishments and yet the society was not very favourable to her.

09:11You have to get this very very straight. The society comes from us and we are our bodies.

09:18So when you say society is the oppressor, it is really the configuration of the human

09:22brain that's the oppressor. Our oppressor lies in our cells. Our oppressor sits in our DNA.

09:32We cannot just say society. What do you mean by society? Society is public, society is

09:35people, society is human beings. What drives those human beings? You say their desires

09:40and their opinions and their ideologies. Where do their desires and opinions come from? They

09:45come from the way your bodies are, just as everything about a bird comes from the way

09:50its body is, just as everything about a fish comes from the way its body is. The real oppressor

09:57is the body. The woman must challenge her body. The woman must learn to channelise her

10:03body towards her real goal. The woman must learn to disown the goal that this male-centred

10:13society has given her and even when we say that the society is male-centred, actually

10:18it is not. Because in this game of exploitation, both the man and the woman are partners, just

10:28that the man is the active player and the woman is the passive partner. So that has

10:34to be challenged and that is my request. Do not take your biological mandate as the purpose

10:42of your life. The purpose of your life is to rise higher. The purpose of your life is

10:50to realise your bondages one after the other, challenge them and break them and the body

10:57is in itself a primary and a major bondage. Do not take the body as an asset in itself.

11:05Even if the body is an asset, it is an asset to be used in service of liberation. You have

11:13to use the body in a way that aids your liberation. The body is not an end in itself. The body

11:21is at best a means. Use the body rightly. Use the body as a vehicle that takes you to

11:27your real destination. Do not live for the sake of the body. Do not live to fulfil the

11:33desires of the body. That's not what we are born for, neither the man nor the woman.

11:38Thank you Achyutji.

11:46See, I understand. My responses go way beyond the scope of the question. But if I limit my

11:53responses to what your questions, what they ask for, then there is no progress. We need to go beyond.

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