It's Failure Not To Tell Your Daughters This!

"Don't forget to tell your daughters about Serena Williams.

Don't forget to tell your sons about
accepting a woman's strength.

Tell your sons to let her fly.

Tell your sons to learn how to cook, so then there's no point turning a Serena into a maker of soups, a salt-on-plantain heroine... when all she wants to do is kick ass.

Tell your daughters not to be afraid of the power within.

Tell them to lead wars. Tell them to walk on water.

Cuts from broken glasses will heal. If they want to find out how pain feels, let them.

The experience is more important than the cuts.

Don't forget to tell your daughters about dreams.

Let them know they are equal to men.

Get them bicycles to ride. Teach them how to swim. Enrol them in a French class. Buy them books. Let them read. Tell them the story of Deborah. Earn a black belt. Fight.

Let them ride a horse. Kill a rat. Crush a roach under a foot at 5.

Tell them they are enough.

Tell them they are whole. And amazing. Beautiful. Brilliant.

Allow them to be odd. Different. Crazy.

Tell them about naysayers. And their place beneath a pile of poop.

Talk about bills. And financial freedom.

Talk about Anger. Talk Determination. Talk Peace. Talk Greatness.

Talk about Nina. And Shonda. And Oprah. And Mo. And Morrison. And Maya.

But most importantly...

Don't forget to tell your daughters about Serena Williams.

The greatest."

Written by Joy Isi Bewaji (Happening Magazine).