4 minute read
Fear stopped being a protector and started being a prison.
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Fear is not your enemy. It has kept you alive. It has kept you safe. It has warned you of danger and protected you from harm. But somewhere along the way, fear stopped being a protector and started being a prison. It began to whisper that you are not strong enough, not worthy enough, not capable enough. It began to convince you that the safest place to be is the place where nothing changes.
And you believed it.
You have shrunk yourself to fit into spaces that were never meant to hold you.
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You have made yourself small. You have been quiet when you wanted to speak. You have stayed still when you wanted to move. You have said yes when you meant no. You have shrunk yourself to fit into spaces that were never meant to hold you. You have apologised for having needs, for being exactly who you are.
But something in you is tired of shrinking.
You feel a restlessness stirring that refuses to be soothed. A voice that will not be silenced. A knowing that you were not made to live small. You were not made to ask for permission.
That is courage waking up.
Not the courage of warriors and heroes but the courage of a woman who decides she has had enough. These books are filled with such courage.
They are not instruction manuals. They will not tell you how to be brave. But they will show you what bravery looks like. They will introduce you to women and men who have faced their fears and walked through them anyway. They will show you that you are not alone in your struggle, that others have walked this path before you, and they have come out the other side.
It is time to stop shrinking.
1. I’ll Never Write My Memoirs by Grace Jones
Grace Jones’s autobiography reads exactly how she sounds; unapologetic, unpredictable, unforgettable. She survived the music industry, the fashion world, and her own legend by refusing to be anyone but herself. It is a masterclass in boundary-setting. Jones never learnt to make herself smaller for other people’s comfort and watching her navigate life on her own terms will make you examine where you have been shrinking.
2. Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward
Ward’s novel follows an enslaved girl named Annis as she is sold south and forced on a terrifying journey through swamps and cane fields. But Ward writes in the tradition of the magical; spirits guide Annis, ancestors speak, the earth itself holds memory. It is a masterclass in finding light inside darkness. Annis endures the unendurable through connection to those who came before. You will finish it believing in your own invisible inheritance of strength.
3. The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd
Based on the real-life story of Sarah Grimké, daughter of a slave-owning family who became a fierce abolitionist, and Hetty “Handful,” the enslaved girl given to her as a handmaid. Their parallel stories span thirty years of struggle for freedom, physical and spiritual. It makes history visceral. You will understand that freedom is never given,it is claimed, inch by inch, generation by generation.
4. The Red Tent by Anita Diamant
Dinah is a minor figure in Genesis, the daughter of Jacob and Leah, mentioned briefly in a troubling story about rape and revenge. Diamant imagines her full life: the women’s tent where she learned ancient wisdom, the loves she chose, the losses she survived. It recovers silenced voices. You will think differently about whose stories get told, whose pain matters.
5. Yet Here I Am by Jonathan Capehart
The Pulitzer-winning journalist’s memoir of growing up gay and Black in America, finding his voice, and surviving the forces that tried to silence him. Capehart writes with warmth and wisdom about becoming yourself against the odds. It is proof that you can be exactly who you are and still find your place.
