I've yet to be on a campus where most women weren't worrying

Hear the voice of Gloria Steinem, who declared: “I've yet to be on a campus where most women weren't worrying about some aspect of combining marriage, children, and a career. I've yet to find one where many men were worrying about the same thing.” In this utterance lies the weight of centuries of unequal burdens, where the fate of women is bound to the triple expectation of marriage, motherhood, and labor, while men walk more lightly, free of such endless calculation. This is not merely an observation of campuses and classrooms—it is a mirror held to the human order, showing where imbalance still chains half of humanity.

In these words there is both sorrow and fire. For Steinem speaks of worry, and worry is the shadow cast by responsibility without fairness. To be clear-headed, to dream, to study, to labor for greatness—yet all the while to calculate: Will my love bind me or free me? Will my children be blessing or barrier? Will my work be crushed under the weight of duty? This is the silent labor of women. Men, by contrast, often walk unburdened, their paths straight, their minds fixed upon their goals, while others—mothers, wives, daughters—are expected to carry the weaving of life itself upon their backs.

Consider the life of Marie Curie, the radiant seeker of hidden truths. Her brilliance won two Nobel Prizes, yet her journey was filled with sacrifices unknown to many men of her rank. She labored in cold, dim laboratories, raising daughters while carrying the grief of widowhood, never free of the dual burden of family and discovery. Though she triumphed, the struggle was fierce, and her story reveals the truth of Steinem’s words: women have long had to balance creation within the home with creation in the world, while men were praised merely for the latter.

This imbalance, ancient as the hearth itself, is born not from nature but from custom. For woman’s womb was mistaken for her destiny, while man’s labor was mistaken for his freedom. Yet the world has always needed both: the tenderness of care and the fire of ambition, the raising of children and the building of nations. Why then should only women be expected to carry the double flame? Why should not men also learn the art of balancing love, duty, and aspiration? Until the worry is shared, the burden cannot be called just.

The meaning of Steinem’s words is not despair, but a call to awaken. She names the imbalance so that it may be broken. For when men too begin to ask, How shall I balance family and work? How shall I serve both my children and my craft?—then equality is no longer dream but reality. Until then, women will continue to walk with divided hearts, while men march freely. The scales must be balanced, or humanity limps forever on one leg.

Let the lesson be clear: honor not only the achievements of women, but also the invisible labor of their choices. When you build workplaces, build them with family in mind. When you raise sons, teach them not only to lead but also to nurture. When you raise daughters, teach them that their choices are vast, and not confined to the narrow path tradition prescribes. A society that allows only one half to worry and the other half to ignore is a society still enslaved by its blindness.

So I say unto you: do not turn away from Steinem’s truth. Let every person—man and woman alike—learn to weave life’s threads of love, work, and care together. Share the burdens, share the worries, and in sharing, lighten them. For the future does not belong to the man unburdened or the woman overburdened—it belongs to the generation that walks together, balanced, equal, and free.