Hi Readers! I recently read ‘The Moment of Lift’ by Melinda Gates.
It was in my TBR for a while, but I finally got to it because I was bored of
reading fictional novels. When I first read the index, it was all about gender
equality, family planning & women empowerment. Sadly, my first instinct was
to not read it because it sounded like a geography textbook. But, when I read
one chapter, I couldn’t stop! It is now the BEST BOOK I HAVE READ IN MY LIFE.
Not just this year, not just in non-fiction, but from all of the 200 some books
I have read in my life, this is the best one. Since I have high standards, you
know how much this actually means! So, go ahead & buy it already.
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The Moment of Lift is a book reflecting on how
empowering women changes the world. It has topics such as Maternal & Newborn Health, Family
Planning, Girls in Schools, Unpaid Work, Child Marriage, Women in Agriculture,
Women in the Workplace & the last chapter – Let Your Heart Break: The Lift
of Coming Together.
~~FAMILY PLANNING~~
In the chapter of Family Planning, you can clearly
understand Melinda Gates’ emotions from all the stories she has mentioned. All
the sadness, anger, rage & determination! In this chapter, she has given a
lot of examples. She has also mentioned how we globally have improved when it
comes to the use of contraceptives. And then at the end, you read the main
shocker. She builds up a nice graph from the 1970s till 2019 & finally
talks about how the US is taking away the funding for FDA approved
contraceptives & also eliminating the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program,
among other things. You read so much about how the use of contraceptives is
essential only for the chapter to end on such a drastic note. It haunts you
& makes you think about what the hell is happening in the world!
~~GENDER INEQUALITY
& UNPAID WORK~~
Melinda Gates has given many facts & data
around gender inequality. There were a lot of stories as well. But half the
chapter she also talks about her & Bill's equal partnership. How it
changed focus from being only a partnership to only equality to finally an
equal partnership. She talks a lot about this which I found a bit out of place
for this book, but then of course, she's smarter than most people so she also
writes a justification for that. She says, "We can change the culture by
sharing our stories. That's why I'm sharing mine" & "It seems
false to me to work on issues in the world while pretending I have them solved
in my own life." When you read such absolute honestly from the author
herself, you cannot not go in to deep thinking over everything that she has
observed & written.
~~CHILD MARRIAGE~~
You know that child marriage is prevalent in the
remote parts of the world, but when you read about Melinda's first hand
interaction with the child brides, it just breaks your heart. These girls aged
7 to 11 getting tricked by their own parents into getting married made me sad
at first & then angry. When you leave in a city far away from these
problems, they start to seem unreal. But, after reading about them in ‘The
Moment of Lift’ has made me think about how much more is yet to be
accomplished.
~~WOMEN IN FARMING~~
In this chapter, Melinda Gates tell us how almost
all of the farmers are women. In all of these issues, Melinda never hesitates
to admit how naive she was about things. She isn’t embarrassed to admit it
because after learning about all these issues, she has done a lot of work to
fix them at her own pace. That's why it's another reason why you feel like
you're reading a fellow human's words who isn't perfect but more so like most
of us. It feels like reading a book written by another human being, not a
person who is the co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation living in
the first world country.
All the chapters are important & this book
needs to be read at least twice by every person on this planet. I have given a
gist of the chapters that really touched me. Please Please Please read the
book! If you are not yet convinced, read more about the author below!
~~ABOUT THE AUTHOR~~
The best
thing about these topics is that the author hasn’t put a lot of facts &
data into it. Yes, there is data. But, it is always accompanied with real life
stories. Melinda Gates has travelled the remotest parts of the world &
shared it with us. She talks about how we need to focus on the people who are on
the edge. We need to make outsiders feel like insiders & stop creating a
world where there is an inside-outside parameter. Her experiences are
remarkable & it reflects in all the stories she has written.
Every
story in every remote village has a lot of indiscrimination. There are stories
where the women in the family have no idea about family planning. They have
more than 6 babies with less than 1 year between each of them, which makes
bodies of women & their children weak & more susceptible to diseases.
There is
the story where a young daughter’s mother has to work as a sex worker only to
put food on the table for them. And, when the daughter understands this about
her mother, the daughter commits suicide. There are a lot of such haunting
things that are still happening in the world. The writing is so empathetic that
it gives you goosebumps while reading about all the tragedies. It makes you
want to quit your meaningless job & join their Foundation & make an
actual change. It moves you in a big what-is-my-purpose-in-life kind of way. I
felt like Melinda Gates should be the Queen of the World & whatever she
tells us to do should be the final word. There is still a long way to go. There
are still a lot of things to be done. The first step would definitely be for
everyone to read this precious book. Because if this book cannot make you want
to do something, then nothing can.
Needless
to say that I rated ‘The Moment of Lift’ at 5/5 on Goodreads. Go read it!!
Until next
time,
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