Wisdom from Maya Angelou

The Maya Angelou quotes below feel especially well-suited to follow Days of Remembrance for victims of the Holocaust, which was observed yesterday. These words of wisdom can help humanity move forward towards peace, healing and justice. Born on April 4, 1928, Maya Angelou would have turned 93 this week.

Maya Angelou is also the ideal person to feature the day before our “Write your Mind Open” free writing workshop (Saturday, April 10 at 10:00AM PDT), because she’s opened so many people’s eyes and minds by telling the truth about her life as a black women living in a white society. “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you,” she wrote.

A writer, poet, filmmaker, actor, dancer, civil rights activist, and much more, her list of “firsts” is very varied and impressive. From being the first black female streetcar driver in San Francisco when she was sixteen (her “dream job”—she loved the uniforms), to the first female inaugural poet in U.S. presidential history in 1993, Maya Angelou was a brave pioneer. “When I am writing,” she wrote, “I am trying to find out who I am, who we are, what we’re capable of, how we feel, how we lose and stand up, and go on from darkness into darkness.”

Myra

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