Power Stories

Feminine Power

Feminine Power by Marta Berglez, Writer and President of the International Women’s Club of Slovenia

………..

My whole life has been a challenge; starting from the country, in which I was born: Brazil. In this amazingly beautiful country full of contrasts and with a population of 210 million people, life can be really a challenge.

I grew up as a happy child from a simple family and most of my teenage and adulthood I spent in Rio de Janeiro. When I turned 20, I moved to Copacabana, then Ipanema and Urca, and there I spent the best years of my life.

With all the challenges, I managed to survive, graduate in Psychology and learn four languages.

From an early age, I started working in a big jewelry company. First as a summer job and later on as the job of a lifetime…25 years. In this company, I worked hard and reached great positions. The last one as an International sales manager I traveled all over the world selling beautiful jewels and getting to know amazing people and places.

At the age of 39, I met in Juneau, the capital of Alaska the man that would make me give up my adventurer life and settle down. It was fast and intense. 

By the age of 40, I was married, had a child, left my 25 years old job, and moved to Slovenia, a country completely unknown to me 1 year before.

At 40, a husband, a baby, a house, and a garden! It was a lot for me…

I can say that from Ipanema to Ljubljana there is quite a big distance, and not only geographically.

No Family, no friends, no job. 

Snow, grey days, cold…no one to talk to. A husband mostly at sea.

Never-ending meetings with people I could not understand the language.

It was not easy and still is not. When you migrate, you have to create a new identity, recreate yourself, make a deep trip inside you, and join forces to restart your life.

I started writing again, something that I have always loved; slowly I participated in different anthologies and even got two awards. I met other women. I made friends. I was the president of the Council of Brazilian Citizens in Slovenia, I founded a cultural Project to develop and maintain the Portuguese language and the Brazilian culture. I became the President of the International Women’s Club of Ljubljana, helped organize many charity events, and developed one specifically for women’s support: SILA IWCL Spring Soiree (implemented by an amazing group of SILA IWCL members) which donates money for projects that aim to help women’s causes.

I could not handle the garden…I am sorry. Not the beautiful way Slovenians do. My husband is at sea but still anchored in my heart. My daughter is growing gracefully. She just introduced me to a new challenge… 2 months ago she has been diagnosed with diabetes type 1. A lifetime disease. However, we are doing fine. She is kind, but not weak. She shows me every day her incredible courage to deal with this disease and hand in hand, we 3 move on supporting each other.

I believe in myself and even in times of cloudy skies, I never let my wish for a better tomorrow fade away.

I cry I give up, and come back.

 I dream, 

I pray and swear.

 But I never give up on myself.

So…wherever you are at this point of your life I wish you a rebirth. I wish you were strong enough to rebuild yourself, to start again, to reinvent yourself, to stay where you are, or to follow a different road. I wish your willpower melts any rigorous winter and your dreams refresh any dessert you may step. I hope your actions and your beautiful soul talk louder than any language. I hope you are bigger than your country. May people ask you less ‘from where you are’ and more sincerely: ‘How are you’.

Keep the Faith and let the feminine power that transcends time, space, languages and borders shine through you.