Ijeoma Umebinyuo Quotes & Sayings

1. You must let the pain visit.
2. You must allow it teach you
3. You must not allow it overstay.

(Three routes to healing) — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

Stop the idea that a woman's beauty is for a man's gaze, that you have the right to touch her. This idea that she must smile and accept unwanted approaches even when she is clearly uncomfortable. Just because you call a woman beautiful does not mean you have the right to behave like her beauty belongs to you. There are women healing from scars gotten from men who have called them beautiful yet offered them pain. The beauty of a woman is hers and hers alone. There are triggers for some women, respect this and know this. The beauty of a woman is hers and hers alone — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

The white feminist becomes the CEO. The black feminist becomes the exiled rebel. The white feminist speaks about teaching literacy like i should thank her, hold her hand, kiss her for teaching children of darker skin. The black feminist should be grateful. The black feminist wears her natural hair, she is called 'too rebellious'. The white feminist cuts her hair, she is brave. The white feminist gets featured on TIME. The black feminist is the fine print. — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

Start now. Start where you are. Start with fear. Start with pain. Start with doubt. Start with hands shaking. Start with voice trembling but start. Start and don't stop. Start where you are, with what you have. Just... start. — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

forcing manhood
on boys with skin
still made of
silk and mother's love
is cruel — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

So, here you are
too foreign for home
too foreign for here.
Never enough for both. — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

The day your education makes you roll your eyes at your father. The day your exposure makes you call your own mother uncivilized, the day your amazing foreign degrees make you cringe as your driver speaks pidgin english, may you never forget your grandfather was a farmer from Oyo state who never understood english. — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

Do not
drown yourself in a man.

He will leave you struggling to
breathe. — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

I am too full of life
to be half-loved. — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

So many broken children living in grown bodies mimicking adult lives. — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

Stay away
from men who peel the skin
of other women, forcing you to
wear them. — Ijeoma Umebinyuo

You did not carry yourself
away from pain
to become pain itself. — Ijeoma Umebinyuo