Imani “Faith” Missouri, Coach Faith, is a servant leader, personal development and leadership coach with over 10 years of experience in the nonprofit, community development and education sector. Read below as she shares her love for reading and the value of representation.

Greetings from a reformed shoe collector and love sustaining bibliophile! Walk with me in spirit and truth as I share how intergenerational exchanges through literature have shaped my leadership, modeling, critique and advocacy of equity, representation and inclusion.  I acknowledge that I have a thang, yes, thang for books and young adult fiction in particular. As a child, I was encouraged to seek truth, inquire when I didn’t understand and imagine greater possibilities. Books were and still are a vehicle for me to continue that cultivation both as a reader, writer, creative and coach. Young adult fiction in particular has taught me about healing through storytelling, the power of representation and how I can better show up as a model and mentor to the next generation.

Today, walking into a bookstore or library is kryptonite for me. When I was younger this addicted love *cue Bebe & CeCe Winans* started with my observance of my grandmother reading the Bible at her bedside, and the Troll Books and Scholastic book fairs at school. Yes, I know I am dating myself. I was the one anxiously anticipating the booklet and prepping my pitch for a greater allowance. Capitol One asks “What’s in your wallet?” Let’s just say my literary desires were greater than what I had in my change purse. Most of my selections included The Goosebumps, The Babysitters Club and a few one-offs with a female protagonist. None of the characters looked like me and they weren’t experiencing the world the way I was - a young Black girl from the South Bronx growing up in a single parent household with the nuclear support of my grandparents, aunts and uncles. I did my best to see and dream beyond that disparity. I knew then something was missing. Things began to change with Mildred D. Taylor, a Newbery Award-winning African-American young adult novelist from Jackson, MS.

My grandfather used to tell me “You ask too many damn questions!”

Mildred D. Taylor’s Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry drew me in from the cover - flames of fire burning in the background as an older child comforts another in front of a home. Set in Mississippi the book explores the struggles African Americans endured in the 1930s, the same decade my grandmother was born. The story’s protagonist was nine year old Cassie Logan. Despite its exploration of Jim Crow segregation, Black landownership, sharecropping, and lynching, I saw myself in the texts. I saw my grandmother, I saw my history. More adjacent to my family’s history in the rural South, Mullins, S.C specifically for my maternal grandmother and Montgomery, AL for my paternal grandmother, I traveled back in time seeking truths my grandmother wasn’t ready to share. I remember feeling the fear, pain and rage wondering when and if she would ever be ready to divulge what she walked and labored through. Being a descendant of enslaved peoples in this country comes with generational trauma. I was poised and observant enough to notice the remnants of that trauma on my grandmother, a woman of very few words yet strong in her faith. 

I eventually got up the courage to share what I was learning through Cassie’s account. My grandfather used to tell me “You ask too many damn questions!”. That questioning paid off because my grandmother stretched herself to connect with the text; my rambling and excitement had piqued her interest. I was insistent on placing the sequel, Let The Circle Be Unbroken on her nightstand right beside the Bible. She read it from beginning to end and looked up definitions for words she didn’t know in the scorched page dictionary from an apartment fire she and the family survived in the 1960s. I am blessed to still have a laminated copy of the book with my grandmother’s handwriting on the cover.

She saw herself in the story. She spoke their names, she wrote their names, she shared in the experience. 

I was so moved by my grandmother’s inquisition and resilience. She blessed me with the foundation of my faith in the Bible and I have relics of her determination to engage, heal and be seen. 

This intergenerational exchange has remained a backdrop to my mentoring relationships. Angie Thomas’s The Hate U Give helped me channel my rage surrounding police brutality, racial profiling and White fragility. At the time of the book’s release, I was working in the nonprofit sector and yet we weren’t naming the racist history of policing in this country. In solidarity with Starr Carter, I posted an article on my white board with a signal “If you want to go there, we can take it there” to anyone who entered my office. When the movie came out, my mentee, Ahtziry and I went to the theatre to see it. If there was a certain decorum for a mentor responding to racial trauma and triggers, I failed. That decorum was left on the 4 train. I cursed and yelled at the screen. I apologized and my mentee replied “It’s okay”. We cried and comforted each other for the first time. 

Lilliam Rivera’s Education of Margot brought it home for me. The location, culture, language and cadence of the Bronx jumped off the pages into my soul.

I saw my neighbors in Margot, I saw my mentee, I saw myself. We are here. 

Reading is a privilege that my ancestors were punished and brutalized for engaging in. Our stories were lost along with our native tongue. The reservation and fear that initially held my grandmother bound is countered when I read. It is freedom. It is justice. It is community. It is a bridge. Despite the misappropriation of the gift richness of storytelling, I’ve leveraged these coming of age texts as a guide for further evolution, personally and professionally. Young adult fiction continues to teach me how to show up boldly, resist, create and seek truth as a leader. 

To my mentees Ahtziry and Jadeen, thank you. When I fall short, you remind me to strive for greater impact and purpose. I am proud to celebrate you, along with the Cassie’s, Starr’s and Margot’s this month. Your journeys will inspire the pages of stories to be told. You are your own protagonist; show up in full divine permission to be you. To my mentors, it’s time to expand the bench to sponsorships.  We have a foundation for equitable representation. Grandma, thank you.  Let the circle of our stories remain unbroken. 

More About Imani

With 8 consecutive years of women’s education, Imani is especially dedicated to uplifting women across generations. She is the creator, host and producer of the Forward 40 (4tea) podcast, which highlights the experiences of 40 women of color on the rise in the nonprofit and social enterprise sectors. She is also the founder of The Forward Academy, a faith-centered professional development platform for women of color seeking to define themselves beyond their titles.