Dominika Kulczyk: Let no one tell you how to live your life

When the pandemic paused the world, we also paused. It took humility and silence to accept this new norm, and to survive in it. Seek inner wisdom and accept ourselves for our choices, what impresses us and what we reject, to build good relationships with the world – with tenderness.

Tenderness and freedom

I think that today is the time to go further. The inner wisdom, which we found through tranquillity and peacefulness, is asking to lean in and reach for freedom to be yourself.

This wisdom should be a stimulus, an encouragement to disagree with a situation in which someone else is telling us what is just right. One can get lost in the overflow of the information and world news, and come to a conclusion that there is no indisputable authority, infallible experts or prudent apolitical governments. Who should we trust and listen to? Perhaps ourselves - our inner wisdom which tells us what is right and what not and does not want us to remain silent. Perhaps we should listen to wisdom, which is asking for a feminine, empathic understanding of one another, sometimes in weakness. Perhaps this weakness and ability to speak about it is the strength in itself. Strength to reach for the unknown despite the risk of falling.

We want a better, more tender world, but it won’t create itself. We need a change, which is an immanent part of life. Life, which despite pain, fear, uncertainty, burden of responsibility and questions about what happens next – is brought to the world by a woman. A woman who has the strength and courage to create a new life despite fear. Reach for yourself. Reject what her inner self does not agree with. Not accept carelessly, but with inner wisdom check why? Have the courage to be free.

Let no one say how to live, how to look, and how to earn – how to be. Be your final wisdom, the only instance. Only then you can connect with the world with tenderness. In freedom. In freedom from fear that you are not enough, or that you’re too much. Be your freedom.

 

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Kulczyk Foundation invites all NGOs and organisations to the next round of grants, which will focus on supporting organisations led by women, or those leading projects which address gender inequality and support women and girls.

Being a woman cannot be a barrier to employment, opportunities for professional development and realisation of her passion.

Every year Kulczyk Foundation runs two rounds of grant making, each providing a total of 250,000 Polish zloty, with up to 25,000 Polish zloty per award. Applications are open until 30 June 2020 to organisations registered in Poland.

More information on the Kulczyk Foundation website: www.kulczykfoundation.org.pl

  • Dominika Kulczyk - an investor and a philanthropist, president of the Kulczyk Foundation, which is committed to supporting infrastructure and aid projects in developing countries. The author of 60 documentary films on issues related to gender inequality and discrimination of women. Vocal supporter of the Sustainable Development Goals set by United Nations (UN) in 2015.

The article was published in „Magazyn Świąteczny” of „Gazeta Wyborcza” from 9-10 May 2020