Being an Angry Black Woman is a Bold Thing not a Bad Thing
[Music]
it was june 17
2009 at 5 42 in the morning
i can vividly remember the day and the
time because that morning i was
especially frazzled and a little
irritated
that i was already 12 minutes behind my
morning schedule
which meant i was going to be late again
so i raced out of my front door
i rushed to strap in my two-year-old
three-year-old
and my five-year-old into their car
seats jumped in the car
started the ignition put the gear into
reverse and stepped on the gas pedal
only to hear a loud boom
in all of my chaotic and frantic rushing
i had forgotten just that quickly
that my husband had just pulled his
brand new car
directly behind mine i
could not believe i had just done that
i held my head down low i let out this
sigh of disgust
and i put my gear back into park and
just sat there behind the steering wheel
and as i sat there i could feel these
emotions starting to stir
inside of me emotions of discouragement
disappointment frustration and even some
sadness
and then i could feel the tears starting
to well up in my eyes
and eventually those tears started to
stream down my face
uncontrollably now the tears
and the emotions that i felt in that
moment they weren’t just a reflection of
what had just happened
it was much deeper than that those tears
and those emotions were a reflection
of the fact that i knew i was no longer
living life
i was just existing in it i was on
autopilot i had a great sense of
frustration that i wasn’t
living to my fullest potential wasn’t
walking in purpose
instead every day my life felt chaotic
and rushed i was always
rushing to drop the kids off or rushing
to pick the kids up
or racing off to the full-time job that
i worked that paid the bills but didn’t
make me feel
nurtured inside didn’t make me feel like
i was doing the thing i was supposed to
be doing
i was sick and tired of being sick and
tired i wanted something different
i wanted to be that woman who wakes up
in the morning and you’re excited and
energized about what you get to do
i wanted time freedom and financial
freedom
i wanted to be able to tap into my
god-given gifts
and use that to impact the lives of
other girls and women all around the
world
i wanted to create legacy that thing
that you passed down to someone else the
thing that long outlives your physical
body
and most importantly i wanted to be a
model for my three children
of what it looked like to find the thing
you
know you are born to do and to do it
without regrets
and without apologies
as i sat there eventually those tears
that were once streaming down my face
dried up
and the emotions that i initially felt
now became a new emotion
anger and for the first time in my life
i gave myself permission
to feel that anger to be fully in it to
sit in it and embrace it
now i had never done that before because
all of my life i was taught
to run from anger to shun it at all
costs especially
as a black woman growing up i watched my
mother
my grandmother my aunts all go out of
their way to abandon
being labeled as angry at all costs
but for me in that moment the anger that
i felt
made me feel empowered no other emotion
had ever made me feel that way
i felt this internal drive a push and a
motivation
like cheryl now’s the time for you to do
something different so that you can
experience something different
that anger in that moment made me want
to disrupt my
norm so that i could create a life that
i was in love with
so yes in that moment in 2009 i was an
angry black woman
and i did not apologize for it i was
unashamed about being angry
now i understand that all of us have our
own perspective and viewpoint of what
that phrase really represents
most times people hear that phrase and
they automatically associate it with a
black woman who’s
hostile aggressive rageful even
confrontational
i’ve even heard people say statements
like i can’t wait for the day
when a woman like senator kamala harris
can show up as her full
self without the fear of being labeled
as an angry
black woman so the reality is it has a
negative connotation
most times people associate it with
something that’s toxic and destructive
even harmful but for purposes of our
time together today
oh i want us to be intentional about
reframing the narrative
around what that phrase really
represents i want us to go on a journey
together of realizing
that being angry as a woman doesn’t have
to be a bad thing
it can be a bold beautiful badass thing
just imagine the possibility that anger
can actually be the catalyst for women
stepping out boldly and courageously to
pursue the things that they love to do
consider the possibility that anger can
actually be productive and constructive
con constructive and productive instead
of destructive
and instead of harmful or toxic imagine
the possibility
of anger being the very emotion that we
shun but should be the motion that we
embrace
because it allows us to get out into the
world and demand what we want
instead of hoping the world gives us
what we deserve
after all in my own experience what i’ve
witnessed is that when a woman gets
angry enough
she typically steps into action to
create change
that’s exactly what happened to me in
that day on 2009
i literally took all the anger i had
been experiencing in that moment and i
channeled it into
passionate movement i allowed my anger
to become
fuel for who i was going to become
i started thinking bigger i started
visualizing a different reality in that
moment
i started thinking about goals that
could become possibilities that
ultimately could manifest into realities
zig ziglar says to reach a goal you have
to see the reaching in your own mind
before you ever arrive at the goal
so anger for me was very productive
it was something that became one of my
greatest assets from that day forward
i started thinking bigger i started
dreaming bigger i started visualizing
and seeing a reaching in my own mind
of a new reality a reality that i would
be in love
with and the start
all began with me dismantling everything
i had ever been taught about how anger
shows up
how it looks how it behaves and instead
creating a new reality about anger and
how it shows up
and looks and behaves that propelled me
to do something i had never done before
anger gave me
me this momentum to succeed and to
thrive
so i started a business i started my own
speaking and coaching business
which was completely outside of my norm
but that was the beautiful thing about
anger it became my loudest voice of
reason to say
cheryl go for it take the risk do what
scares you get outside of your comfort
zone
and i decided that from that moment
forward i was going to leverage
anger as one of my greatest assets
so when i launched that speaking and
coaching business i allowed anger to
come along with me for the ride
i remember about a year and a half or so
into my business i got angry
that i wasn’t generating the level of
profits that i knew i had the potential
to generate
i was serving the world at a high level
but my bank account was not reflective
of my level of service
that made me angry well that anger
allowed me to align myself with the
actions
that would create change and
transformation
so i took action i hired a coach who
could teach me how to sell
a coach who could teach me the power of
persuasive languaging so that i could
magnetize clients in
who would be willing to invest at a
higher level
that resulted in me increasing my rates
and charging what i was worth without
guilt
a few years later after i become
profitable in my business and i started
traveling the world speaking into the
lives of women
i got angry that i still wasn’t being
invited to certain tables you know those
right tables that we really want to be
invited to
and honestly that made me angry but once
again
anger became my voice of reason to say
cheryl why are you waiting
on someone to extend an invitation for
you to come to their table
when you have everything it takes to
create the table
anger was giving me this drive and this
motivation to do things i had never done
before
and that’s what i did that moment i
started creating my own tables and
inviting other amazing women and boss
leaders in
to connect to collaborate and to grow
together
so in every situation for me especially
in my business
anger was the thing that became
productive
and constructive that catapulted me into
my next level
elevation and as i consistently started
to experience these results
i wanted to duplicate it so i created a
three-part solution so that i could
rinse and repeat it and keep getting
these amazing results based on anger
and that three-part solution is to
analyze acknowledge
and act on your anger and as i
implemented that eventually i got to
walk away from that corporate job that
paid the bills but i didn’t love
and walked into my full-time passion as
a speaker
and as a coach impacting the lives of
women all around the world
as i kept getting these results and
literally watched the trajectory of my
life start to shift
i wondered could this work for other
women after all maya angelou says
each time a woman stands up for herself
without knowing it and possibly without
claiming it she stands up for all women
and i wanted to stand up for all women
so i started taking this message about
adopting anger and leveraging and
maximizing it i started taking it to
women’s groups and conferences and
organizations and companies all over the
world to introduce them to this concept
of not abandoning anger not running from
it but leveraging it
maximizing it using it not only to
propel them into setting new goals
but also to crossing the finish line of
achieving those goals
what was the result hundreds of the
women that i partnered with
they started launching these powerful
messages missions and movements
many of them started writing
best-selling international books they
started taking international stages and
sharing
their stories they started creating
global brands that allowed them to touch
other people with their unique
fingerprints that
is what i was born to do that’s what i
wanted to continue to do
so today i offer to you the three-part
solution
that has catapulted me into a new level
of elevation and many of the women i’ve
had the opportunity to serve
first analyze to analyze to carefully
examine or even dissect something
give yourself permission to carefully
analyze your anger
and do it without bias give yourself
permission to get to the root of your
anger what are the underlying emotions
that’s causing that anger to rise to the
top
and then examine your options for
maximizing the anger instead of just
harboring it or suppressing it
as a bad or harmful emotion and give
yourself permission even
to launch a powerful message mission or
movement that’s going to transform your
life and the lives of others
as a result of your anger second
acknowledge
to acknowledge something is simply to
exist the existence of a matter
so acknowledge that anger is a normal
human emotion
that every race and every gender
experiences and that you are
not some awful person just because you
get angry
in fact maybe now is the time for you to
get angry angry that perhaps you’re
playing smaller than your potential
angry that perhaps you’re still sitting
on the book that you know is inside of
you that you should have written already
maybe now is the time for you to get
angry that you are playing smaller
and you’re dimming your light to make
somebody else comfortable or that you
haven’t launched
the business whatever the thing is give
yourself
permission to embrace to validate
and then to act based on your anger and
third
act create a constructive plan of action
for your anger
decide how you want to laser focus and
channel that anger and something into
something greater
into something profound that impacts
other people’s lives and then take steps
every single day to move towards
whatever the desired result is
that you have created in your mind
because remember you have to visualize
it before you can achieve it
i believe every woman regardless of race
has at least a small dose of angry black
woman inside of her
that can serve as fuel and momentum for
who she’s becoming
for her being able to become the
greatest version of herself
so if you’re a black woman i challenge
you from this moment forward not to ever
allow anybody else to demean you or
diminish you or make you feel less than
simply because they use that phrase
angry black woman instead claim your
power over it
wear it as a badge of honor own it
and hold your head up high and give
yourself permission to validate
every emotion that you experience as a
woman yes anger
included if you’re a woman of any other
race other than a black woman
i challenge you to examine your
perspective
of what that phrase really means and
represent and then link arms with us to
help us to reframe the narrative around
it
so that all of us as women are proud
that we are boldly courageously using
our anger
to impact lives to create new
initiatives and to create change in the
world
i challenge every woman to be very
intentional about
maximizing your anger so that you can
become the greatest version of yourself
and the next time you see a black woman
or any woman who you think is angry
applaud her celebrate her support her
maybe even join her and realize
that she’s probably up to something
positively explosive
that is about to change the world and
transform lives
thank you
you