Sometimes I feel like words come into my head and spirit that won’t let me go. It comes very clear and silences everything around it. As soon as last week’s unboxing came out my spirit screamed the word AUDACITY.
In this edition, we explore all facets of audacity and how that determination to commit to self can propel you forward in life.
THE AUDACITY TO BE BLACK AND FEMALE: NETFLIX’S HIP-HOP DOCUMENTARY, ‘LADIES FIRST’
To me, audacity can manifest itself in two ways: arrogance and, more interestingly, bravery. Sometimes I miss the audacity I have demonstrated in my own life, the biggest being starting my business. And every so often I get to experience people’s audacity up close. Like the constant audacity of men that look like me thinking they can do my job better than me.
Thinking through their behaviour has helped me reaffirm my work – oftentimes they’re coming with ideas I’ve already had, no thoughts of collaboration and no tangible action.
Watching Ladies First, Netflix’s documentary on women in hip-hop was reassuring. As the world celebrates 50 years of the billion dollar genre that permeates the fabric of our culture, we get to hear from women directly how they’ve often been pioneers. How they’ve been left without acknowledgement of their contributions. How they were penalised for being women, for being black, for being mothers, for speaking their truth and how they’ve progressed to own their sexuality and widened the scope of their business.
I recognised myself in some of their scenarios, misogyny and the suppression of Black women is not exclusive to the music industry but what made me proud is they have consistently overcome barriers faced and spoke for all of us. A person can never go wrong if you have a Black woman championing you. In fact, success is almost certainly guaranteed. Gender and racial activist Julie Casto Abrahams agrees in this interview shared on LinkedIn.
THE AUDACITY TO PROPEL OURSELVES FORWARD: FEARLESS FUND SUED FOR SUPPORT BLACK WOMEN
This story follows on neatly from Julie Castro Abrahams’ comments on Black women in business. You see a shed load of content on starting a business with the same rudimentary advice: make sure you register, make sure you have a good business name etc.
What feels a little less visible – probably because it’s a lot more complex and bespoke to be fair – is how to scale your business. A statistic often quoted is that 0.02% of venture capital funding in the UK has gone to Black women in the last decade. The stat can be even less depending on whom you’re speaking to. In light of this, there are collectives who come together to plug holes in the gaps, generating opportunities for those who truly need it to help their businesses thrive.
This is true of American organisation, Fearless Fund, who give funding to early stage businesses run by Black women. They are being sued by am organisation I don’t care to mention for racial discrimination as reported in Forbes.
The charge is being led by a white American male – whose name I don’t want to share either – is that the fund violates the American consitution which states that people shouldn’t be discriminated against based on heritage. This same Conservative individual managed to successfully challenge the law against affirmative action, originally put in place to mitigate against barriers to entry to education and employment by people of color.
As a Black female business owner myself I understand the challenges that Fearless Fund set out to tackle. As the fund’s co-founder Arian Simone discusses in her interview with CBS Mornings, it’s not just money Black women may not have access to. It is resource and connections. This can often be miscatagorised as the need for ‘mentorship’. Whilst an extremely important, if you’re not getting access to the same resources as your counterparts mentorship is rendered useless. It’s not because women don’t know what they’re doing, they simply are not allowed or afforded the opportunity to be as equipped as their counterparts.
In a world where white men are the least oppressed group, it is incredible to me that this solitary man is committed to stiffling the opportunities of those around him. What does make sense though is that he understands the power of a Black woman and how our resilience and relentless would ensure success and certainly unbalance the current state of play.
THE AUDACITY TO BE SELFULL: BOZOMA ST JOHN MEETS STEPHEN BARTLETT AND REMINDS US TO PUT OURSELVES FIRST
You know me well, you know I love Bozoma St John. We have a number of personal and professional similarities and she has featured on my vision board consistently for the last four years.
Bozoma has been the Chief Marketing Officer at some of the biggest brands in the world including Netflix, WME Endeavour, Apple and others.
There was a period that Stephen’s podcast, Diary of a CEO felt a little too over emotional by their trailers but they have improved in recent years.
What really resonated hard about this interview was Bozoma declaring that we have to get selfish to live our lives to the fullest. “Noone is above me in my life” she declares. “Not even my kid”.
This was a full revelation to me. In a world where the narrative is often that black women’s backs are often the footstool for society to hear this declaration blew my mind. We’ve been taught that being selfless made you a ‘good’ person but as Bozoma says how can you be a true contributor to life if you’re not 100% fulfilling your wants and listening to your desires. Will definitely be listening to this episode again to hear a new perspective on what I’m choosing to call being selfull.
THE AUDACITY OF THE PRIVILEGED: TRAVELLING 40,000 TO GIVE BIRTH
This story in the Birmingham Mail made me roll my eyes for a number of reasons but let’s get into what the story is. A couple from Birmingham left their home and eight year old to travel across the world to Grenada. All pretty straight forward. Their goal? To have a ‘natural’ birth on the beach as the lady was 35 weeks pregnant.
They (thankfully) gave birth to a healthy baby girl but now cannot leave the country as they are unable to register the baby as no one witnessed the birth and therefore they can’t get a passport to leave Grenada. The couple say they feel abandoned by the British government.
Everyone deserves to fulfil a dream. To travel to another country and be so unprepared that you didn’t even check the law of land and now you say you’re abandoned by the British government is the next level of entitlement. There are whole swathes of people who were invited into this country to build systems like the NHS who had their legally given documents destroyed by the UK government and now live (or have passed) under duress. So annoying.
THE AUDACITY TO SHOW UP: SOMALI RUNNER BREAKS WORLD RECORD…FOR THE WRONG REASONS…
This is my ‘And finally…’ moment like The Daily Show (Has anyone noticed that the show hasn’t recovered or settled since Trevor leaving?) This footage went viral after it was revealed that the Somalian Athletics chairwoman had put her untrained niece into the 100m race at FISU World University Championships in China. (You can read the story in The Gaurdian)
Now I’m sorry this tickled me hard as you can quickly tell the Somali runner was untrained. I couldn’t help but wonder if she was looking for something to put on her CV. What impressed me the most was her confidence to show up, take her place and complete the race even if it took her twice as long as the runner who won it. It’s a metaphor for life really. She showed up and despite it all she made it and can say she took part in a 100m race. Interestingly she set a world record for the slowest time ever.
AND ON THAT NOTE…
Despite the challenges, one thing you should know is that we’ll keep dancing, like my little internet niece right here.
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