Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Thinks It’s Bullsh*t That Young Women Have To Be ‘Likable’ ~ Alanna Vagianos

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is here to remind young women that whoever likes you or doesn’t like you should have no effect on your self worth. 

On May 19, the Nigerian author was honored at the 2015 Girls Write Now Awards, where she gave a riveting speech directed at young women — reminding them that their stories and their voices matter. “I think it’s important to tell your story truthfully and I think that’s a difficult thing to do — to be truly truthful,” Adichie told the crowd in New York City. 

She said that it’s hard for women to be truthful when telling their stories because we’re conditioned to be concerned about offending people. Adichie told the young women in the crowd to forget about being liked. “If you start off thinking about being likable you’re not going to tell your story honestly because you’re going to be so concerned with not offending and that’s going to ruin your story. Forget about likability,” she said. 

“Forget about likability”

“I think that what our society teaches young girls and I think it’s also something that’s quite difficult for even older women, self-confessed feminists to shrug off is that idea that likability is an essential part of the space that you occupy in the world,” she went on. “That you’re supposed to twist yourself into shapes and make yourself likable, that you’re supposed to kind of hold back sometimes, pull back, don’t quite say, don’t be too pushy because you have to be likable. And I say that is bullshit.” And that’s what we call a crowd pleaser. 

Thank you, Chimamanda for reminding all of us (even the self-confessed feminists) that being liked should never stand in the way of telling your story. 

Watch her entire speech in the video above.

 

Living Out A Dream by Dani.Love

It has been a while since I’ve contributed to this lovely space. There are 3 incomplete pieces still waiting to be completed and posted. But for now, I wanted to share with you a project I’ve been working on for the past 2-3 years.

Have you ever read a book and felt or thought it would make a great film. Like, as you read the book, the visuals are just so vidid in your head. The best books live on in our dreams and daydreams, those are the ones you read multiple times and bring up randomly in conversations. One of those books for me was Water in a Broken Glass by Odessa Rose.

I first read the novel in 2006 or 2007 while I was living in DC (my hometown) right after underground. That was a rough time for me and I remember reading a lot to escape my reality and also writing a lot, a lot of dark pieces that were actually pretty revealing and therapeutic. At any rate, I ordered the novel from Amazon after coming across it during my many sessions of searching for novels with black lesbian/gay woman. When it arrived, I dived in immediately. To say the book was good and I could relate is truly an understatement. Odessa truly captured the struggle of coming into your own as a woman and a gay woman. The fear, the self talk, the wanting to do “right” by the people you love, the confusion…. everything one goes through during a time like this, she captured it so authentically and beautifully. Up until this time, I’ve never read a character who I could relate to on that level. So, of course, I fell in love with the novel because I felt it was part of my story. A story I was currently living.

Before finishing, I knew I had to find a way to get this story on the big screen. How was uncertain, but I knew this story had to be shared on a bigger platform. I ended up reading the novel about once a year, usually during the summer. Each time, I fell in love all over again. I believe it was the 4th time I read it, back in 2011 when I decided to look up Odessa Rose and contact her about adapting her novel. I didn’t even know what adapting a novel entailed but I said, F* it, let’s see where this goes.

After finding her email on her website, I composed a heartfelt message to Odessa, praising her work, letting her know what her (first) novel represented to me, and proposing to adapt her work into a screenplay. I even admitted I knew nothing about screenwriting but I would make it my business to not only get it done but do her beautiful body of work justice. She responded immediately, informing me that someone was already working on a screenplay. I remember her email being really nice but I was still a little crushed, beating myself up even, because I thought I missed my chance and I should have acted sooner.

During the following months of our initial email, Odessa and I kept in touch. She offered me words of wisdom as a new writer, as well as a list of books that inspired her to write (and keep writing). A few months later, she emailed me to ask was I still interested in adapting the novel. Uhm, of course!!!! So she connected me to the woman who has been working on the screenplay for the past year.

Fast forward 2 years later, the screenplay is DONE, we have casted and hired crew and uhmmmm, this little birdie isn’t only living out her filmmaker dream, she is adapting one of her favorite novels of ALL TIME and one of THE novels she has always wanted to see on the big screen! Like, how cool is that???

I’m truly grateful, honored, excited, and part of me still feels like I’m dreaming. A few weeks ago, we filmed our crowdfunding campaign video (Water The Film) and I got to meet the author, the wonderful Odessa Rose. Needless to say, I was super excited and just overjoyed meeting her. She is such a kind spirit and I’m glad I finally got a change to express to her, in person, how wonderful her work is and how, despite her being a straight woman, she really did a great job telling a story of woman struggling to live her truth as a gay woman.

I’m not too certain how to end this blog post. I do want to share this film journey’s story and hope whoever reading this is engaged and will support us, even if it’s just sharing it with your networks. I ask, please, and I encourage it!!

Thanks for reading this far. And please watch, read, and share Water The Film.

Peace.

VitaSoul – Henry Van Dyke

“Use what talents you possess: the woods would be very silent if no birds sang there except those that sang best.” – Henry Van Dyke (1852-1933); Author, educator, clergyman

VitaSoul – Steve Maraboli

“We are designed with a dreaming brain and a hopeful spirit; it is our nature to envision the life of our dreams. And while dreaming comes easy to us, we must never forget that it takes strength, dedication, and courageous action to bring that dream to life.” ~ Steve Maraboli (born 1975); Author

VitaSoul – Henry David Thoreau

“If we will be quiet and ready enough, we shall find compensation in every disappointment.” ~ Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862); naturalist, author, philosopher

VitaSoul – Neil Gaiman

“I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes. Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You’re doing things you’ve never done before, and more importantly, you’re doing something. So that’s my wish for you, and all of us, and my wish for myself. Make new mistakes. Make glorious, amazing mistakes. Make mistakes nobody’s ever made before. Don’t freeze, don’t stop, don’t worry that it isn’t good enough, or it isn’t perfect, whatever it is: art, or love, or work or family or life. Whatever it is you’re scared of doing, do it. Make your mistakes, next year and forever.” ~ Neil Gaiman (born 1960); Author

VitaSoul – Rainer Maria Rilke

“Once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue, a wonderful living side by side can grow, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole against the sky. ” – Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926); Excerpt from Letters to a Young Poet

VitaSoul – Richelle E. Goodrich

“Don’t ever give up. Don’t ever give in. Don’t ever stop trying. Don’t ever sell out. And if you find yourself succumbing to one of the above for a brief moment, pick yourself up, brush yourself off, whisper a prayer, and start where you left off. But never, ever, ever give up.” – Richelle E. Goodrich; Author

VitaSoul – Agatha Christie

“I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable, but through it all I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing.” – Agatha Christie (1890-1976); Writer

VitaSoul – Henry David Thoreau

“If one advances confidently in the direction of one’s dreams, and endeavors to life the life which one has imagined, one will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.” – Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862); Naturalist, author, philosopher