We Are Allowed to Have Many Chapters
Maya Angelou
Editor’s Note
For September, L’aurelei D. brings Maya Angelou into a conversation about the many versions of ourselves we live long enough to meet.
In an issue about inheritance, legacy, and memory, her reflection reminds us that what we carry forward does not have to keep us the same. We are allowed to revisit our stories, understand them differently, and keep becoming.
— Mia
Founder & Editor, The Living Room
This month we turn the page to Maya Angelou, a woman who lived many lives within one lifetime and had the courage and honesty to write authentically about them.
Maya Angelou was a poet, author, educator, and activist. Many of us have read or know her book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, but what I find especially fascinating is that Angelou didn’t stop there when writing her story.
Over the course of her life, she wrote seven autobiographical books.
She continued returning to her own story, writing about different seasons of her life and what she had learned along the way.
There is something I love about that.
We often tell our life stories as if our lives can be summed up by one defining experience, one struggle, or one accomplishment.
Maya Angelou’s writing reminds me that we are allowed to have many chapters.
We are allowed to change our minds, make mistakes, experience joy and sorrow, find ourselves again and again, and gain new understanding about experiences we thought we already understood.
When I think of Maya Angelou, I also think about the famous poem Still I Rise.
Those words have stayed with me through my many chapters, so much so that I have a tattoo of those very words.
For me, it has always been more than a poem or a phrase.
It’s a reminder that whatever season I’m in, there is always more of my story left to live and write.
There are versions of me that I’m grateful for, versions I’ve outgrown, and versions I haven’t even met yet.
I think there is freedom in knowing we don’t have to have ourselves completely figured out.
We can learn.
Change.
Begin again.
And tell a different story when we know more than we did before.
As we move into the cozy indoor months, check out one of her autobiographies, poems, or even picture books. I am sure there is one for whatever season you are in.
L’aurelei D.
Founding Bookshelf Curator
IG: @Laurelei.Durr