During Navratri, the whole of India gets into a frenzy to celebrate the nine-day festival with a lot of zeal and fervour. Parvati or Shakti gets the adulation even from the most egoistic of men who think they own a woman—they raise no questions on her strength and physical endurance in these nine days.
Shiv and Parvati are regarded as the most beloved couple in the Hindu culture, they are revered throughout the year in one form or the other. But such hypocrisy against religious beliefs comes from actions in real life. The life of Shiv and Shakti as a couple is against every other system that has been built in our normal lives.
Starting with the facts of life of Shiv and Shakti, Parvati as an incarnation of Shakti was the one who got mesmerised with Shiv first and decided to pursue him by meditation (तप). She even starts meditation against the wishes of her mother, albeit her father was also reluctant initially. Translating this in today’s world, there have been a lot of instances of honour killing. A girl is supposed to marry with the approval of her father or face consequences. Devi Parvati was never a traditional housewife. She was a demon slayer and was involved in maintaining the balance on the earth.
As far as stories go, Nandi was the one responsible for maintaining the household even before Devi Parvati came to live in Kailash. Occasionally, Parvati cooked for her children, but it has never been portrayed that Lord Shiv expected Parvati to cook. Shiv and Parvati were said to have a lot of disagreements and fights. The results of these fights were sometimes Shiv leaving her or sometimes Parvati leaving to pursue their cause. Neither of them stopped each other from getting what they wanted.
The important fact is both Devi Parvati and Lord Shiv were warriors, but Devi Parvati fought more wars than her husband. This fact never made Lord Shiv less confident or jealous of his wife. He was never particularly concerned about her looks when she took different avatars to curtail the evil. Lord Shiv has been shown to care about nature and personality displayed by Devi Parvati. He has been shown to push Devi Parvati to achieve greater heights than him.
Lastly, children were never a major factor between them. When Shiv and Parvati were supposed to get married, they were cursed that they will not have children naturally. In spite of this, they got married to complete each other. The Hindu religion, if seen from the context of Gods and Goddesses, was never about cooking food and waiting for each other. It was always about supporting each other and completing their own allotted tasks.
But in the human world, everyone is stuck on fulfilling certain expectations in a marriage, oblivious to what they crave. Subconsciously, even the most advanced follow the same script written through society rules. We need to reevaluate our social norms about marriage with changing trends. There is no hard labour needed for individuals to obtain food for their survival. If Shakti is true, then women can be in the army and on the front-lines and if Shiv is true, then men can both be feminine and masculine.