As a child I was infatuated with Barbie. I also idolized
the princesses in movies such as the Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast. So
as a young child I thought the concerns of a woman were solely to obtain
physical beauty, dress in sexy clothes, and to find prince charming. But as I grew
up I realized the images created by Barbie and Disney princesses were not
realistic and that women are capable of so much more.
Today I feel inner empowerment as a woman when I see
an intelligent female with strong determination running for office or in any leadership position. Sometimes I do catch myself
focusing on a woman’s look or on her outfit because that is what society has
trained me to do. But I manage to refocus and find encouragement in seeing a fellow
female in an authoritative position. My personal career goal is to hold a position
of power within a company after achieving my accounting degree. Most of the
women that I look to as examples that support my career goals are not in movies
or on TV.
I do agree with the idea that having no role models
in the media leads to a lack of women leaders. I don’t watch much TV right now
in my life but in the past I really enjoyed reality shows. I would look forward
to episodes of Keeping Up with the Kardashians and the Jersey Shore. These shows
fixated on superficial beauty and displayed the party scene as glamorous. I
wanted to look like Kim Kardashian and I wanted to party like Snooki. Thankfully
I got over that quick but many young girls do not.
