Monday Motivation: Phenomenal Is A Person; Phenomenal is Maya Angelou

April 10, 2017

Marguerite Anne Johnson popularly known as Maya Angelou is a name you have probably heard one too many times. Phenomenal, strong, bold, inspiring, courageous, amazing and brave doesn’t even begin to describe the Force that is Maya.

This Jill of all trade – poet, memoirist, writer producer, singer, night club dancer, cab conductor, journalist, fry cook, actress, mother, University Professor, civil right activist and more – was not afraid to LIVE and THRIVE. A connoisseur of many firsts, Maya lived through a number of obstacles, rising above it all. From having a difficult childhood tinged with the messy dissolution of her parent’s marriage, experiencing racial injustice as a little girl, sexual abuse as a teenager, teenage pregnancy and single parenting, to working odd jobs to survive, this ground breaking, history making woman turned her early life experiences into a widely successful memoir titled I know Why The Caged Bird Sings which made literary history as the first Non-Fiction bestseller by an African American woman.

Gary Younge in 2009, wrote an article published in The Guardian where he said of Maya: “To know her life story is to simultaneously wonder what on earth you have been doing with your own life and feel glad that you didn’t have to go through half the things she has.”

Maya, who was born April 4^th1928, is definitely an inspiration to little girls and women all over the world. We celebrate this woman who is not just an example of Black Girl Magic, but is MAGIC.

In honour of her post humus 89^th birthday, here are a few of our all time Favourite Quotes from Maya Angelou:

The “Push Party” Everyone Was Talking About This Weekend

“I’ve learned that you shouldn’t go through life with a catcher’s mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw something back.”
“If you have only one smile in you, give it to the people you love.”
“You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have”
“Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it.
“History despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.”
“We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.”
“My great hope is to laugh as much as I cry; to get my work done and try to love somebody and have the courage to accept the love in return.”
“My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humour, and some style.”
“I love to see a young girl go out and grab the world by the lapels. Life’s a bitch. You’ve got to go out and kick ass.”
“I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it.”
“Prejudice is a burden that confuses the past, threatens the future and renders the present inaccessible.”
“Love recognizes no barriers. It jumps hurdles, leaps fences, penetrates walls to arrive at its destination full of hope.”
“When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.”
“Nothing will work unless you do.”
“You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.”
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
“If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.”
“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”