International Women's Day 2014
Participants form a female symbol as part of celebrations for International Women's Day in Manila, Philippines March 8, 2014. Reuters

International Women's Day (IWD) is celebrated throughout the world around the theme 'Equality for women is progress for all.'

IWD has been observed since the early 1900s and was established by Socialist International, in their meeting in Copenhagen in 1910. The next year, the first International Women's Day was observed in several countries, including Austria, Demark, Switzerland and Germany, according to the International Women's Day website.

In 1977, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution proclaiming a United Nations Day for Women's Rights. The United States allotted the whole month of March as Women's History Month. Countries like Cuba, Belarus, Cambodia, Afganistan, Ukraine have declared Women's Day a national holiday. In China, the day is a holiday for only women.

Below are some inspirational quotes on women empowerment.

    1. "Woman is the companion of man, gifted with equal mental capacity." - Gandhi
    2. "If you want something said, ask a man; if you want something done, ask a woman." - Margaret Thatcher
    3. "Women who seek to be equal with men lack ambition." - Marilyn Monroe
    4. "Nobody can make you feel inferior without your permission." - Eleanor Roosevelt
    5. "The history of all times, and of today especially, teaches that women will be forgotten if they forget to think about themselves." - Louise Otto-Peters
    6. "Whatever glory belongs to the race for a development unprecedented in history for the given length of time, a full share belongs to the womanhood of the race." - Mary Jane McLeod Bethune
    7. "Women have served all these centuries as looking glasses possessing the magic and delicious power of reflecting the figure of a man at twice its natural size." - Virginia Woolf
    8. "By and large, mothers and housewives are the only workers who do not have regular time off. They are the great vacation-less class." - Anne Morrow Lindberg
    9. "Women are the real architects of society." -- Harriet Beecher Stowe
    10. "The fastest way to change society is to mobilize the women of the world." - Charles Malik
    11. "Remember the dignity of your womanhood. Do not appeal, do not beg, do not grovel. Take courage, join hands, stand beside us, fight with us." - Christabel Harriette Pankhurst
    12. "A free race cannot be born of slave mothers." - Margaret Higgins Sanger
    13. "Somewhere out in this audience may even be someone who will one day follow in my footsteps, and preside over the White House as the President's spouse. I wish him well!" - Barbara Bush
    14. "Think like a queen. A queen is not afraid to fail. Failure is another steppingstone to greatness." - Oprah Winfrey
    15. "I really don't think I need buns of steel. I'd be happy with buns of cinnamon." - Ellen DeGeneres
    16. "The thing women have yet to learn is nobody gives you power. You just take it." -- Roseanne Barr
    17. "A girl should be two things: classy and fabulous." - Coco Chanel
    18. "Women are leaders everywhere you look -- from the CEO who runs a Fortune 500 company to the housewife who raises her children and heads her household. Our country was built by strong women, and we will continue to break down walls and defy stereotypes." - Nancy Pelosi
    19. "God gave women intuition and femininity. Used properly, the combination easily jumbles the brain of any man I've ever met." - Farrah Fawcett
    20. "A charming woman doesn't follow the crowd. She is herself." - Loretta Young