You know, I have to admit that much of how I think of myself as a woman–and to be honest, about I met my husband when I was 19 and married him when I was 20. Before I was 22, I had my first baby. All but 2 of my years as a woman have coincided with my years as a wife and mother.
And yet, I know that there must be more to Womanhood than being a wife and mother. Lately, I’ve been wondering what exactly that is? What are the characteristics and purposes that we as women, as daughters of God and sisters in the gospel, share despite our family circumstances? What makes a woman a woman?
We know from the Proclamation on the Family that we were created in the image of God and that we are daughters “of heavenly parents, and, as such, each has a divine nature and destiny. Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.” But what exactly does that mean? What are the innate characteristics of being feminine that existed in us even before we had bodies? And what does being female have to do with our identity and purpose? In order to answer these questions, I’ve collected a few quotes.
Our prophet has said:
Woman is God’s supreme creation.Only after the earth had been formed, after the day had been separated from the night, after the waters had been divided from the land, after vegetation and animal life had been created, and after man had been placed on the earth, was woman created; and only then was the work pronounced complete and good.
Of all the creations of the Almighty, there is none more beautiful, none more inspiring than a lovely daughter of God who walks in virtue with an understanding of why she should do so, who honors and respects her body as a thing sacred and divine, who cultivates her mind and constantly enlarges the horizon of her understanding, who nurtures her spirit with everlasting truth. (“Our Responsibility to Our Young Women,” Ensign, Sept. 1988, 11.)
President James E. Faust has said:
I wonder if you sisters fully understand the greatness of your gifts and talents and how all of you can achieve the “highest place of honor” in the Church and in the world. One of your unique, precious, and sublime gifts is your femininity, with its natural grace, goodness, and divinity. Femininity is not just lipstick, stylish hairdos, and trendy clothes. It is the divine adornment of humanity. It finds expression in your qualities of your capacity to love, your spirituality, delicacy, radiance, sensitivity, creativity, charm, graciousness, gentleness, dignity, and quiet strength. It is manifest differently in each girl or woman, but each of you possesses it. Femininity is part of your inner beauty.
One of your particular gifts is your feminine intuition. Do not limit yourselves. As you seek to know the will of our Heavenly Father in your life and become more spiritual, you will be far more attractive, even irresistible. You can use your smiling loveliness to bless those you love and all you meet, and spread great joy. Femininity is part of the God-given divinity within each of you. It is your incomparable power and influence to do good. You can, through your supernal gifts, bless the lives of children, women, and men. Be proud of your womanhood. Enhance it. Use it to serve others. (James E. Faust, “Womanhood: The Highest Place of Honor,” Ensign, May 2000, 95)
On fulfilling our God-given purposes, Mary Ellen Smoot has said:
Each of us has a vital role, even a sacred mission to perform as a daughter in Zion. … It is our destiny to rejoice as we fill the earth with greater kindness and gentleness, greater love and compassion, greater sympathy and empathy than have ever been known before. It is time to give ourselves to the Master and allow Him to lead us into fruitful fields where we can enrich a world filled with darkness and misery” (“Rejoice, Daughters of Zion,” Ensign, Nov. 1999, 94).
“I suggest that you … humbly ask the Lord what he would have you do and why you are uniquely suited to serve. Ask yourself questions like these: ‘What can I contribute?’ ‘Why was I chosen to be the mother of these children?’ ‘What can I do to strengthen the sisters in my ward?’ and so forth. We each have purpose and reason for being. Every sister has a thread to weave in the tapestry of time. Discover your thread and begin to weave” (Relief Society, the Possible Dream [address delivered at the 1998 Brigham Young University women’s conference]). (“Finding Nobility in Motherhood and Joy in Womanhood,” Ensign, Jul 2002, 71)
Elder M. Russell Ballard has said:
Every sister in this Church who has made covenants with the Lord has a divine mandate to help save souls, to lead the women of the world, to strengthen the homes of Zion, and to build the kingdom of God. Sister Eliza R. Snow (1804–87), the second general president of the Relief Society, said that “every sister in this church should be a preacher of righteousness … because we have greater and higher privileges than any other females upon the face of the earth” (“Great Indignation Meeting,” Deseret Evening News, 15 Jan. 1870, 2).
Every sister who stands for truth and righteousness diminishes the influence of evil. Every sister who strengthens and protects her family is doing the work of God. Every sister who lives as a woman of God becomes a beacon for others to follow and plants seeds of righteous influence that will be harvested for decades to come. Every sister who makes and keeps sacred covenants becomes an instrument in the hands of God. (M. Russell Ballard, “Women of Righteousness,” Ensign, Apr 2002, 66–73)
As daughters of a Heavenly King, it seems clear that in order for women to fulfill their roles and purposes in the gospel and on the earth that we needed special talents and blessings. To some degree or other, and based specifically on the tasks that we need to accomplish in our life, we women have been endowed with special power from on high: kindness, gentleness, capacity to love, compassion, empathy, feminine intuitions, creativity, charm, graciousness, natural grace, dignity, quiet strength, and more.
We need only look at the world around us to know that these very qualities are sorely in need. And whether we are single, married, widowed, divorced, mothers, grandmothers or not, we are part of a great sisterhood with a weighty work to accomplish. The specific role the Lord would have each of us play is something that we will have to prayerfully seek out. But one of the greatest clues in discovering our individual missions is to carefully take a look at the gifts he has given us and see how we can best apply them. He gave them to us for a reason.
The more I think about this, the more I think it is a waste of time to compare myself to other women. Yes, there are other women who keep a neater home than I do, who are more creative at making Halloween costumes, who are better cooks, who are more organized. Maybe other women look at me and see things that they lack. But rather than mire myself in envy and disappointment, I can rejoice knowing that if there are areas where I fall short, a beloved sister has been given a gift to help me. If there is a battle I feel ill-prepared to fight, I have a sweet spirit sister who will watch my back if I let her. Instead of letting our differences be sources of division, they should knit us in unity and make us stronger.
We women were born to be queens.
