Maya Angelou was a woman with the power to impact lives from the tip of her tongue to the turn of her pen. From a young age she was deeply affected by the world around her; Maya had a vision for how the world should be, one that we need to continue to strive toward today and tomorrow now that she is gone.
Born in 1928, Maya led a challenging life full of obstacles, racism, and pain, all of which she could have let cripple her. At the age of eight she was raped by her mother’s boyfriend, and subsequently stopped speaking after her rapist was murdered, presumably by her relatives.
Young Maya believed that her words, upon speaking about the incident, were the reason for his death. If her words could cause so much pain and death, she decided that she never wanted another to come to harm because of her. She went five years without speaking a single word because of this fear.
But finally, she realized that her words did not connote pain, but rather power. She had the power to tell her story, and to positively affect the lives of others. Out of this experience and many others, she became an author, a poet, an actress, and an activist, among other jobs, to make ends meet in a world so cruel to women of colour.
Maya had the ability to bring a voice to the issues no one else could. She spoke from her heart, and encouraged others to follow.
Maya not only used her writing to inspire change in the world around her, she became an activist, working towards freedom for all despite their race. In this work, she witnessed the assassination of fellow friends and activists. Again, she could have called it quits, called it all too much. Instead, she pushed on.
She continued to shape her experience into her writing and humanitarian work. She led a life in pursuit of justice and civil rights for people of colour, and for all to have access to equal education. Her fiery passion for equality and optimistic outlook towards the future fueled many of her peers and successors.
Maya once said, “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” She pushed past racial and gender oppression just to tell us this. Now that Maya Angelou has left us, with her words and her actions leaving a mark on us all, it is our job to do the same: to push ourselves past all we know, specifically personal pain, and embrace all that we can be.
