What Do You Want?

I have been thinking about a small question. The smallest one I know. What do you want?

Ask it to a woman who has spent her life caring for other people, and watch what happens. She pauses. She looks a little lost. Then she smiles and says, whatever you all want is fine.

She is not being shy. She is answering honestly. Somewhere along the way, she stopped knowing.

I want to be careful here. This is not about grand dreams. It starts much smaller. Which film to watch. What to cook on a Sunday. Where to sit. The little wants that fill an ordinary day.

For so many women, even these go quiet. Not all at once. Slowly, like a light being turned down.

The good girl who wants nothing

From the time she is small, a girl learns a quiet rule. Be good. Be patient. Think of others first. Don't want too much. Be a little less, so everyone else can be a little more.

At first she does it out of love. Then out of habit. Then because she has forgotten there was ever another way.

There is a name for what this does to a person. Researchers call it self-silencing — slowly hiding your own needs, feelings, and wishes to keep the peace and keep people close.

It sounds gentle. It is not. When a woman buries her own wants for years, the sadness does not vanish. It sinks down and settles, quietly, where no one can see it.

She learned that wanting things for herself was selfish. So she stopped wanting, and called it love.

And here is the part that stays with me. She does all of this behind a smile. In the photos she looks happy. At the table she looks content. The wanting did not leave loudly. It left without a sound.

And this is not a story from some older, darker time. It is happening tonight, in 2026, in homes with fast phones and bright screens. The people who believe it is over have simply never thought to ask the woman beside them.

You can watch it begin with something as small as a plate of food. I want to look there next.

References

• Silencing the Self: Women and Depression, Dana Crowley Jack, Harvard University Press, 1991.
• "How Indian Women Are Destroying the Idea of Sacrifice (and Finding Self-Worth)," Times Life, 2025.
• "We Hate Indian Mothers Until We Become Them," Feminism in India, 2025.

Watch what a woman like this eats. Or rather, watch what she lets herself want.

The best piece of fruit goes to the children. The softest part of the meal goes to her husband. The last of something sweet, she saves for someone else, every single time.

When there is one good mango left, she will swear she never liked mango.

I'm not hungry, she says. Sometimes it is true. Often it is a habit so old she no longer hears herself say it.

Food is a small thing. That is exactly why it matters. Wanting starts in the body. A favourite taste. A second helping. A treat chosen just for you, because you felt like it.

When a woman gives even that away, day after day, something quiet is happening. She is teaching herself, one meal at a time, that her own wanting comes last.

She did not lose her appetite all at once. She gave it away in small bites, until she forgot she had one.

The same people who study self-silencing noticed this. When a woman learns to put her own needs at the very bottom, it does not stay at the dinner table. It spreads. Soon she gives way on everything, without even thinking.

I find myself wondering how many women could not name their own favourite food anymore. Not because they never had one. Because no one has asked in twenty years, and they quietly stopped keeping track.

None of this belongs to the past. It happens now, in homes with full fridges and food on call at the tap of a screen. If you have never once seen it, that may say more about how closely you have looked than about how rare it is.

If appetite is the first wish to go quiet, the bigger dreams are not far behind. I want to talk about those.

References

• Silencing the Self: Women and Depression, Dana Crowley Jack, Harvard University Press, 1991.
• "'Silencing the self' and women's mental health problems," a 2020 research review (Maji & Dixit).