Everything is possible: your creativity to give voice to the under-represented narrative
A conversation between Adepero Oduye, actress, filmmaker, singer, and writer, and Adama Sanneh, Moleskine Foundation CEO.
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Adama Sanneh: Adepero it’s great to have you with us.
Adepero Oduye: Thanks for having me.
AS: In this conversation, we always ask our guest to come up with three words that somehow can guide the chat that we’re going to have, and these three words are a way to reveal a little bit where your mind is in that moment and the type of things that you are reflecting on at this moment. And I think so far, they have been a great way to start this little journey that we that we’re going to have together. So, I know that the three words that you choose where Remember, Baba and Joy and maybe you can tell us a little bit about why those three words popped into your mind when we started preparing for this exchange.
AO: Yeah, I think the first two words, Remember and Baba, are very connected in a way. Baba is what I call my father. He wasn’t dad or daddy. To me, he was Baba, but they’re connected just because of what he used to remind us, just remember who you are and where you came from. And then Joy, I don’t know. Joy was something, the word that kept popping out, so two other words that were contenders for that last word, and that was the one that kept coming up. So, it just came with my gut, so I’m curious, maybe you’re questioning, your lines of questions will maybe unpack why I picked Joy as the third word.
AS: Maybe because you were telling me that recently you’re reflecting a lot of this idea of memory and remembering. Where does it come from?
AO: I can’t remember the inspiration at this point in time, but it’s something that keeps coming up. And maybe it’s because of where we are in the world and in the time and in the country, meaning US and being Black. And being an artist and being creative and attached to an industry that is kind of complex, perhaps, depending on who you are and this idea of like remembering who you are, where you come from and let that remembering dictate your knowing, because you have to know to remember your true, true self. And for me, it’s just divine, powerful, beautiful spirit. And when you know that and you move from that, you can move through anything, all of the stuff, the nonsense, the B.S. And depending on where you are and what you’re doing, it’s hard to remember that. It’s hard because there’s so many voices, whether we’re talking about dominant culture or white supremacy, racism. Everyone was talking about the Crown Act like, oh, how do I wear my hair? All these things that kind of make you, it’s easy to forget you are kind of drowning and depending on your age and who’s around you. This idea of remembering who you are, then I feel like that is such a powerful, powerful, I don’t know, weapon for a lack of a better term, but kind of like what we talked about, it’s like remembering your true self, not remembering someone’s idea of who you are, because that, as we know, can get us in a lot of trouble. And that’s a whole another conversation.
AS: I like it, it’s I think it’s in this way, you pose the question of remembering almost, I would say, as an act of creation and recreation in the sense that the question is you go back to remember who you are, but until how do you know that? How do you know who you are? And it’s almost like a process of continued recreation and evolution and I’m kind of wondering maybe we can delve a little bit in your background here, in the sense that you are Nigerian, your parents are from Nigeria, they immigrated to the United States, then you grew up in New York. I think from the beginning, in the makeup of your life, there are a lot of dynamics happening at the same time. And the multiplicity of identities that you’re dealing with or that you’ve been dealing with so far as something that many people that are of a second generation or like of a mixed background. I recently seen one of your interviews that it was quite funny to say when “I’m in New York, I’m a Nigerian woman, when I go to Nigeria, I’m very much an American woman.” All that the contradiction that happened there. So, because you are now in this reflection of remembering who you are, what would be the answer that you have at the moment to this question?
AO: I’m connected to something higher than me and whatever that thing is, that energy that literally is in everything, is connected to me, I think that’s the main thing to remember, so that obviously, New Yorker, woman, Black Nigerian, all those things, that’s like the first and foremost thing.
I’m connected to something I will never understand in my life. I can feel something, I can feel there are things that make me remember those things when I’m talking to other people, or eating something or traveling or, looking at the sky. But, yeah, it’s that thing that I will never, ever understand, but I feel very strongly.
This feeling is very strong, and I have always had it since I was a little child.
AS: Yeah, so this feeling, how did it somehow this translate in navigating through all those apparent contradictions that you needed to leave through your life at some point, before you were using all the complexities that you needed to face, from high level things, from white supremacy to being a black woman to being an actress in general to be an immigrant to a certain extent, and all those macro conditions that somehow are impacting your life. So, what I’m trying to understand is two things. On one side, how this this process of remembering who you are, help you or is helping you navigating all of this. And then to add something else, it is also the idea of you being a creative being: what does it mean being a creative being and how that impacted your life so far?
AO: Yeah, I think everything is kind of attached to my parents. One of the words is my father because he’s passed. So, again, it’s connected to the thing that’s outside of me, the foundation of who I am is from my parents and that foundation of really knowing my culture and all the ways in making sure that it was like living growing up in Brooklyn, it was like little Nigeria in our apartment, and so my parents were very clear and my father was super-duper clear about making sure that we knew exactly who we were, that his daughters only had black Barbie dolls, that we were reflected in ourselves, and we saw ourselves through his words and in our culture. Every picture day, we would wear traditional clothing. So, imagine going to school people were like “What are you wearing?” You know, my clothes are encrusted with stones and the kids are like, what? I have my hair threaded. So that foundation was strong and then it was built in me and fortified so as I move through life there was a knowing like, OK, my father was very big on you can do anything that you want. I mean, my father is probably one of the smartest people that I’ve known. Very, very much focused on education and had many, many degrees, PHDs and all of these things. And, he was like, you can do anything that you want. You can do absolutely anything that you want.
And so, me becoming an actor. I was who I was, and it was just all of these forces trying to impose themselves on me, which made it at first confusing, the assumptions, the categorizing. But because I was clear, I was so clear. The thing that I knew was that this is going to happen as me with my name as is or not at all. And I said that when I first started, not even knowing what the journey was going to be like exactly. But I knew that there was no way that I was going to contort myself or change myself for, you know, for anything. I wasn’t going to do that. And that came from my parents, from that foundation.
AS: Why did you want to become an actress?
AO: That’s a great question. I’ve always been creative. It wasn’t an aspiration as a child. I never, ever thought I that was something that I would ever do, so I was very creative. I sang, that was my thing, when I was younger. My first job was as a teenager, they were hiring high school students to be workshop leaders, this program where you led workshops with different groups of people but using improv acting. And so, I got that job as a fluke. I was literally on my way to get a job, in this job fair at the hospital because I wanted to be a doctor, typical Nigerian. And these people stopped me. They were wearing colorful t-shirts, and said do you like to sing and act and dance? And I was like, yeah, sure. And then they like, let’s come and interview. And it was just from that, they hired me on the spot and that’s what happened. And that was my very, very first job, the first thing I ever got paid to do, but not at the time thinking, oh yeah, I’m going to be an actor. But I loved every second of it, like it was challenging. And I really started to open up and like really express myself in ways I was encouraged to take initiative, to express myself in and take on leadership roles, it was a wonderful program. It was called Lifelines, it’s still going on in Brooklyn.
And then, I finished high school and I went to college. I was on the path to pre-med and I think early on in college I realized this is not it, I don’t want to do this. But I kept on going because that was the expectation. And then my father passed away suddenly my junior year in college. And that changed everything. It changed everything. He died young and it was sudden. I just kept thinking about, life is too short. My parents have been working for something for so long, and then in the blink of an eye, it’s just gone. And so, while we’re here, we might as well just do what we want to do. But at that point, I didn’t know what I wanted to do. And I remember I sat, and I meditated, or I don’t know what I would call meditation, but I was like, what am I going to do? I’m not going to medicine. I realized I was doing it because of my father. I’m not going to medicine. OK, what am I going to do? And I sat still for a long time and this voice just said “acting” and I was like, well, literally it was as if a voice said acting. And it was so weird and random, I thought at the time. And I was really trying to go, no, no, no, I have to go, I have to get another degree, maybe I’ll do public health, maybe I’ll do this. And to make the long story short, there was a guy, one of one of my friends who was an engineer. He was telling us that he was taking this acting class. And I thought, hmm, if he’s doing it, I could do it and I actually had time in my schedule to do that. And so, I took this acting class my senior year for a semester and that it was that first day, I remember we had to introduce ourselves. I hadn’t taken the class yet. I hadn’t done anything yet. But it was just an energy thing. And I said to myself, I want to be an actor without knowing anything, I didn’t know anything. And that class was amazing, had an amazing professor who encouraged me to just not limit myself to roles because of my color or anything. And I love going to class every day. It was challenging because I was notorious for not going to class, just like things that just didn’t interest me. But I went to this class every single day and I threw myself into the challenge of what this thing was. And it just was like an opening, or like meeting myself in a way, and yeah, I graduated, I finished pre-med, but I knew that I was going to try to pursue this thing. And that was that, yeah.
AS: Also, as the Moleskine Foundation, we work in this idea of creativity for social change, and we think about creativity not only from an artistic perspective, but creativity is something more. It is an attitude, a series of methodology, an approach to life in general.
So, beyond your career and giving yourself a career, a job, the way to sustain yourself, how does acting and nurturing your creative self impacted your life more in your everyday?
Creativity is mistaken as only an artistic expression that is happening in terms of performance, but we believe, I believe that creativity is much more, it’s a skill that you can apply to anything that is happening to you.
So, how creativity, acting specifically, but I know that you’re also singing, you’re directing, you use several ways to express your creativity in yourself. But how does creativity impacted the way you see the world, the way you navigate the world?
AO: Well, I think specifically with acting, I feel like my journey as a human being or my journey as an adult, I guess I could say, is kind of like a parallel to my journey as an actor. As an actor I started out I don’t know it is one of those things when you’re young, there is this full expression, like you’re at your fullest expression, unencumbered. And then slowly but surely, you’re starting to learn ways of being, you have to kind of compartmentalize yourself and comport yourself in certain ways. And so, for me, I think I learned to be very close, like guarded with my feelings and my emotions and know maybe that was like my family dynamics.
I don’t know what would have happened if I did not have acted kind to help me break all of those walls down. I had one teacher who specifically saw the walls and, broke all of those down where instead of me having to tuck away the things that have happened in my life, I was able to kind of lift it to art. And so, things that might have been shameful or painful, I didn’t have to hide them or act like they never happened to me. I can lift it to art and music.
And so that just made me an open, vulnerable person, and it was kind of like a lifesaver for me because I don’t know what I would have done if that hadn’t been the thing. I had so much covering myself. And that was it was huge. I yeah, it was huge.
And so specifically that for acting. But then I think as a human being, you just get tired of holding on to stuff, and I found a way to channel all that stuff. And then in the everyday it’s like you’re crafting a life for yourself, where you maybe don’t know your place, you’re trying to craft, create your space in the world, like how can I contribute? How can I feel like I’m earning my place on this earth, in the most authentic, truest way? And what is that I want to do, what kind of life I wanted to create for myself? Whether it’s a day-to-day thing or like, with the five dollars that I have today, how can I create a really good day without feeling like I only have five dollars and I’m broke or I want I see what I want over there, but I am over here and I have to make the most of this so that I can get there in peace and not be tired when I get over there. So, how do you create your life in your world with your thoughts, with your hands? For me, I’m a creative being. I feel like we all are. But specifically, as an actor, when you find yourself waiting for people to accept you or give you a job, that can be far and few between, but every day it’s like, this is who I am and I have to find a way to be who I am, if that’s what gives me joy. And, you know, what does that mean? That can be different on any given day. It’s like, OK, maybe today I have to make something or maybe today I have to watch a movie that I really, really love and just to remind me of who I am and where I’m at or, you know, maybe I cook. I love to cook so maybe today it’s cooking for myself and my family, or having a walk, or just trying to figure out how I can kind of implement creativity, which, like you say, there’s a skill, it’s also a practice, but it’s also who you are. I mean, I think everyone’s creative. Some people might not think that, but I think we are just in the sense of like we create lives, we create families, we create identities, hopefully, of our choosing.
AS: It seems to me that you’re looking at creativity for its etymology, it’s an act of creation. And the moment when you are creative, you actually can modify or be proactive in changing the realities around you, instead of the other way around. And so, I think you clearly said how that worked out for you personally and how through creativity you’ve been able to channel and transform certain things that you were reactive to or you were subject to and then true creativity, you managed to get hold of those things and then transformed it into something you can create and mold reality in the way you wanted on a personal level. And that’s I think it’s quite incredible, you know.
AO: I mean, I feel like this is the power that we all have, we all have that power. And the thing that sucks, is that depending on who you are, there are certain forces, unconscious forces, there are forces that don’t want people to know that power. The thing that was really upsetting, I was just thinking about today, you know, because I’m in Canada and all that stuff about, the remains of children being found, just thinking about like. Wow, real people really purposely made it so that these children could not thrive and that’s just the hard truth and it’s the sad truth. But I think what I’m thankful for is in this day and age with technology and being able to have conversations and talk and see all different kinds of people doing all different kinds of things, it’s really possible to to learn.
AS: I feel when you were talking about the crazy situation that is happening in Canada, more than crazy, you know, mind blowing, but there is this link, I think. On one side of creativity as almost a therapeutic element on a personal level, but now you start hinting to me at the connection between creativity as a tool against oppression and being a Black American actress in this case, you come from a long tradition of incredible people that true creativity has been able to bring about change. You have worked with incredible people from Cicely Tyson to also Cuba Gooding Jr., and many others. And you also portrayed, incredible women like Nina Simone, and so I’m wondering that coming from this tradition, what stand out to you from everything that you learn, either directly from the people that you worked with or that you’ve been just impacted, and you managed to study in terms of, again, this idea of how creativity can bring an entire community forward.
AO: Showing up as you are today might mean something different tomorrow, but it’s like showing up as you choose to show up. I feel like the biggest thing for me, the thing that drives me, there’s so many people who have come before me that have lived, that have struggled, that have contributed so amazingly. And when I think about my field looking around, I also kind of open it up and like, ancestors and my parents and it’s like everything is set up for me to just dream the biggest dream possible. Like really like there is no, the only barriers, truly, I believe, are really is in my mind. You know, if I let what’s outside of me kind of affect me, then it’s going to go a certain way. But I really do I’m always pushing myself. Listen, I have an opportunity here, and I can I’m the only one who can stop myself, because if so many people who were able to do amazing things in spite of what was going on at that time, and they just kept on and even when things were bad, even when things were just super oppressive or whatever, they still were able to just be their fullest expression and to be able to like to take that in now. It’s just amazing in the truest sense of the word. It’s like, OK, what’s inside of me that is dying to come out? And am I honoring that? Am I showing up for myself by moving past fear or carrying fear, but still moving, what is it in me that I’m wanting to share and live? That could be as an actor. That can be as a woman. That can be however I mean, like, what are the things that I want to maybe try today or try tomorrow and what are the things I want to create today? You know, and it’s like honoring that because so many people have honored that in themselves for time, in spite of so much stuff. And I was able to be inspired by and say, OK, where is my part in that? How do I know myself?
AS: Would you have any enlightening moment that comes to mind? Maybe when you were a child or teenager and you’re starting, and you just find yourself in front of something incredible, inspiring that would give it away or obviously, I cannot hide myself to say it will be incredibly interesting what Cicely Tyson would tell you before going on stage and how all that symbolism that is behind that woman, that she represents, that she carries almost to an entire community. How does this personify in everyday conversation? So, I guess do you have something that you would like to share, that you felt that impacted you profoundly on this.
AO: To me, what was so magical about her is that at her age when we worked together. Just, just free and full and it’s almost like just making the most of every moment because she understands that her being able to have this opportunity to tell the story of this woman, it’s so important and it’s so crucial and she just lived it fully and it was a wonder to see. For me, watching her work, it was like she was able to take the same words and make it different every single night, every single performance. And I remember I would be talking to her, but still at the same time be enamored, like, how is she doing this? And I felt like I’m working, but I’m also learning so much at the same time. It’s like this weird thing, like I’m working and but I’m pinching myself and she’s giving so much. And so, when I say I can mix my experience with Black women in this industry and they have been so amazing. And like in the beginning when I was like confused, they just took me under their wing, just really made sure that I was OK, asking Do you know this, I want you to see certain things, like inviting me. I mean, just like a big hug and support and even from afar, making sure that I know we’re here. We got you. We see you. We love you. We support you. Those kinds of things.
And so I will say, Miss Tyson gave me randomly, just gave me a jar of honey. And she said, this is for you. I still have that jar of honey. I don’t know why she gave it to me, but it’s funny that my father’s name translated to honey and the name of my corporation is a mixture of my two parents’ names. So, I’m literally just connecting that now, you know, just reminding myself of that. But yeah, I don’t know if I made any sense, but he had so many experiences.
AS: And in a way, it was this idea that in everything that they were doing, this idea of creativity as this in a sense of creation, in the sense of modifying reality and that revolutionary power that creativity has in a sense of imagining something. Else and then act on it, because something sometimes we keep forgetting that creativity is a practical act, is not just imagination, is imagination. It remains there. It remains the realm of ideas. Creativity is a practical act that is that is happening, that he needs to build something concretely. And in the way you describe your experience also with Miss Tyson, it felt that there is something like that beyond all the incredible accolades, incredible thing that she did this capacity of a city of kindness, of taking care of.
AS: And I was I was wondering because you gave us this idea of creativity, at least this is what I perceive as creativity, as something that can lift you up and kind of connect it to your real self and lift you up from some of the complexity and contradiction of the world. So it’s something that you keep going back to. That’s I think was very clear. At the same time, we’re also political beings and we also need to take care of ourselves, individually, and whoever is considered our people, the type of life that we are facing on an everyday basis and. And I think there is also this aspect of using creativity as a political tool, we say as a tool to get out of oppression. And in this I was wondering about your use of your practice and being an actress and your platform etc., to give voice to underrepresented narratives and how much this is central, if it is in your work, and why do you think it’s important. I know that this might sound like an obvious answer, but I feel that sometimes we forget why it is important to focus and give voices, give a platform to under-represented narratives and to share it to a larger community. And I’m asking this question especially to you, because you’re one of the few people, and in this case actresses that are still able to move in a very interesting way, in a very authentic way, from a very niche project, with some very clear goal and very niche and very artistic, etc., to Marvel now, completely different.
So, I’m kind of wondering a little bit about, again, this idea of under-represented narratives and then how to keep this authenticity and how to leverage the various opportunities and values and the various tools that are out there from your project connected to your work on Nina Simone or I’m thinking about some of your first movies, like Pariah, to now being in a Marvel production.
AO: Yeah, I mean, I think about it. We say creativity against oppression. For me, it’s more about creativity for freedom or expansion of freedom. Because the oppression is not something I can do anything about. But what I can do is really inhabit or exercise the knowing that I’m free. And so that’s how I kind of look at it. And then in terms of the stories, the importance and like you say, like we all know, it’s like there’s something powerful about, not that I need a movie or a song or a comic book or a book or whatever to validate my existence. Technically, you don’t need anyone to validate existence. But there’s something powerful about being able to see yourself reflected out there in the world. There’s just something, and maybe it’s because of depending on who you are or what body you kind of inhabit, that it’s absolutely necessary to see yourself out there in the world. For me, that’s why Toni Morrison is just… When I read The Bluest Eye, that was the first time that I felt like thoughts that were in my head were out on paper and it was, still, maybe not even able to kind of explain what that did. It’s like an oath. I don’t know. It’s just like this. Whatever that means, I’m making this gesture, it’s like an opening. And so, something about that, allows you to kind of move through the space, the space of this world or your city or country. It just, it kind of like sures you up in spite of all those things, maybe it reminds you of, OK, your story matters, who you are matters and that somebody sees you, and you’re not alone. Basically, you’re not alone. Like, I’m not some weird freak, that I’m weird because I thought these things and need to kind of like really quickly to change myself, so I don’t think these things, but I’m not alone in that. OK, I’m not alone. There are people like me and who looks like me and had experiences like me and their artists were able to really express those things and lift it to art, like Toni Morrison is able to lift so many stories and perspective, particularly in women. And in the case of the child lifted to art like what she does in that particular book and stories.
It’s important because it’s like I think about, I was having this discussion yesterday with my friend and they were both grown ass women. And we’re talking about just being able to see different kinds of bodies reflected women who have curves even though I know that I don’t have to kind of like shrink myself or whatever, but we were talking in the car just like, wow, look at this woman who’s on the cover of this magazine and I still need that. I still need that. It’s just like a wind under your sails, it’s like they’re kind of they’re moving but it’s just like an extra push. So, when I do pick that outfit, I’m not going to judge myself for wearing the outfit that accentuates whatever it’s like I’m going just fully I don’t know more and more just be who I am. And so, and again, in terms of the storytelling, like that’s for me, I was always very clear that I wanted to be a part of story, authentic storytelling and hearing the voices that we don’t really get to hear from or the relationships we don’t really get to see.
A lot of people ask me say, well Marvel is kind of such a departure. But for me, it’s not I’m not saying that you said that, but because to me it makes sense because of the story that we see in that, but also the fact that we get to see these brother and sister who are black and it’s like authentic and real.
And I have brothers and sisters. And so, for me, I kind of understand. But so many people comment on, like, wow, we hardly ever see that, and maybe that’s what’s probably really like, oh, there’s something really cool here. Just even seeing like a black brother and sister thing or even if you take the black out of it, just like a really authentic brother and sister, I don’t know, like just the people you see, it’s not necessarily smooth in surface, that it can be really deep. The fact that people kind of are relating to that is like, oh, that’s really that’s really interesting.
And so it’s just important to see ourselves reflected. It’s important, especially for younger people, for children and younger people. And I just think it’s so criminal that for a long time, there wasn’t a lot of children’s books that show who we are. And I’m happy that we’re here now and I’m thankful to be alive and just we need to hear more stories. We need to, I want to continue telling stories however I can. And, you know, for me, the Nina Simone of it all, again, it was like seeing her face and seeing her story in her autobiography, thinking, oh, my God, this woman went through so much and still she was able to create and still she was able to give and it wasn’t perfect. And she looks like me. I’m like, oh my God, she’s got like similar features. And she was out here thriving. Like it just, again, it just opened so much for me in ways that that I can’t quite describe, but I feel like people kind of understand if you’ve been in that situation, because I feel like we all have that feeling, like what does that feel? That maybe that made me think there’s someone out there who’s like me, whatever that means, whether you’re rich or poor or whatever ethnicity or combination of ethnicities or where you come from, it just does something really, really good. Yeah.
AS: I absolutely agree with that in a sense. When you are in front of a narrative that you need to somehow do a series of steps to make it related to you, or when you see with your eyes your body in that narrative, it’s a completely different experience and it brings about completely different outcomes to a certain extent. Since you spoke about Nina Simone and in your project, I would like to ask you this question, not to create any polemic about it because some years back, there was a movie about Simone, and it was a big deal because the actress that was chosen to be the protagonist of that movie is an actress that doesn’t have the physical features that were of Nina Simone. And there was some of the conversation was about that Nina Simone would have not being casted in her own movie. And beyond the polemic of it, what do you think that episode talks about our society and the type of work that we need to do that, that is still ahead of us?
AO: That’s a great question. I think the first thing that comes to mind is that. If their stories that are wanting to come out of us, come through us for whatever reason, we need to we need to honor it and tell those stories. I say that meaning, we can’t and I’m speaking as a woman who is Black, who lives in America. Basically, if somebody is not going to understand what you’re trying to tell, what you’re trying to say, what you’re trying to share from your unique and authentic point of view, hopefully, that you should find a way to get the story done and told. Outside of that, I think that’s the only thing that I or anyone have any control over, and it gets complicated because money, you need money to make things and you need money sometimes and don’t have access to that, and what does that mean? But we live in a time where there are options and we can do many things with what is available to us, and there are a lot of things that are available to us. And we just have to find a way to kind of exercise our power and create what we want to create and not just, not just have a small group of people decide what our stories are going to look like. It’s not invalidating that, it’s just saying like listen, there’s something I want to tell them this way, in my way, in our way, whatever that is, and I’m going to find a way to do it.
AS: Who are you working for?
AO: That’s a great question. Oh, my God. Oh, man. It’s a combination of things. This combination of things, it’s like honoring the large part of myself. That. The energy that creates worlds that created me. I’m a creator but because I experienced life in this body, in this and on this plane, I’m also creating for someone who was maybe 5 years old Adepero, 10 years old Adepero, 12 years old Adepero. I’m creating, I’m working for so many stories that we don’t know that have not been amplified, that should be amplified because those lives, those stories matter. I’m working for myself because I love what I do when I get to do it, when I get to be. I love collaborating with people, I love trying to figure things out. I love people. So that brings me joy, that gives me energy. So, I’m also working for that experience, for myself. Yeah. So really great question, beautiful question. Yeah, no one’s ever asked me that before.
AS: You were mentioning your 5 years old Adepero and then the 10 years old Adepero and 15 years old Adepero, 20 years older Adepero. What will be some advice you give to them, what now, with your perspective and your experience that you have so far, would you give to your younger self and to a younger generation.
AO: You’re also getting emotional again. I think the biggest thing to say to everybody and anybody, I don’t even care how old you are, but particularly children, particularly younger people, is everything that everything that you are is completely valid and worthy. Who you are, you are worthy of the space you take up on this earth, never doubt that for a second. No matter who is saying what, I don’t even care if it’s your mother or your father or your teacher or whatever. You belong here, you are divine, you are powerful. You are love and loved. No matter what, no matter who. The fact that you were born, the fact that you were here, the fact that you were alive is everything.
And this idea that anything is possible. Like, I don’t care what you I don’t care how much money you have, I don’t care what you experienced in this life that your dreams, the big dreams that you have for yourself or are completely possible and that none of that stuff marks you or shames you or hinders you. Yeah, because I feel like a lot of us spend a lot of energy. Trying to get back to the place of remembering. That that we’re worthy and that we’re valued and that we’re beautiful and that we’re good just as we are. Yeah, I think that’s the biggest thing I would say.
AS: And lastly, since we needed to figure it out, why they came out. What is the role of joy? In all of this quest.
AO: Joy, it’s just that feeling that makes you, that reminds you of Life and living. You can find joy in the “smallest” and they put that in quotation marks because small, big, it all depends on who you are. That’s like a subjective thing. It’s just that thing like it’s like a series, like it adds up. I mean, and if you can find or create, Joy, it really it carries so much weight, it carries so much power. When you feel joy, it is like you exercising the biggest of your powers, feeling it, creating it. It’s just like especially if you’re able to do it, if you do it for yourself or you do it for people or with people. It really resonates, it carries the thing that can kind of take you through a day that might not be going so great. It’s like a superpower and we can create it or we can kind of just, like, appreciate it and take it in in spite of you can find joy in the beautiful things, the most stupid things, you know, like I think about like me watching something and just laughing my ass off, and this is like a moment of joy. And it just, when you kind of give yourself up to that again, it carries you to the next moment, to the next moment, to the next moment. Yeah, it’s beautiful. So, I reminded myself to find joy, to create joy, to marinate in joy, like unapologetically. And for me that might be weird. Like my brother and my sister might say man, you find joy in the weirdest of things? And it’s like, OK, that’s fine, that’s subjective. But yeah, it’s just not the shame about it or not shameful, just like quiet about it. I can just be completely just open it and this is what it is even from myself. So yeah.
AS: Adepero, thank you very much so.
AO: Thank you Adama. This is great.
This conversation was recorded as one of the Episodes of “Creativity Pioneers”, a podcast by the Moleskine Foundation.
As the Moleskine Foundation’s vision is to inspire a new generation of creative thinkers and doers, this podcast aims to equip all of us with new perspectives and unconventional ideas to amplify our creativity, critical gaze, and imagination.
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