I love empowering women. I think it's crazy: if you ever try to

“I love empowering women. I think it’s crazy: if you ever try to belittle women, you’re playing yourself — I ride with whoever rides with me.” — These fierce and luminous words from SZA, a voice of her generation, rise like a hymn of strength for the daughters of the earth. They are not mere words of defiance, but of unity, loyalty, and self-respect. In them echoes an ancient truth reborn: that to uplift another is to uplift oneself, and to diminish another’s light is to dim one’s own.

In every age, women have carried the world upon their shoulders — not always in crowns of gold, but in the silent, tireless strength of spirit. Yet too often have they been made to forget their power, to believe that their voices should whisper rather than thunder. SZA’s declaration is a flame against that forgetting. When she says, “I love empowering women,” she calls all who hear her to celebrate one another’s light rather than compete in shadows. Her words are a reminder that the power of womanhood is not found in rivalry, but in sisterhood — a bond older than kingdoms, deeper than blood, and more enduring than stone.

To belittle women, she says, is to play yourself — for in denying the strength of the feminine, one denies the very force that gives life, wisdom, and balance to the world. The ancients spoke of the goddess who spun the stars and nurtured the earth, of queens who guided nations not with the sword but with the heart. When one mocks or diminishes such power, one does not wound her — one wounds the soul of humanity itself. Those who seek to rise by stepping upon others soon find that they have built their thrones upon quicksand.

Look to the story of Harriet Tubman, whose courage carried hundreds from bondage to freedom. She was not rich, nor crowned, nor shielded by armies. Yet she possessed something greater — the unbreakable faith that every woman, every person, deserved to stand upright beneath the sun. She empowered through action, through sacrifice, through the fire of her belief. She “rode with those who rode with her,” leading the way not with domination, but with love’s fierce command. SZA’s words are the echo of that same spirit — the spirit that says: I stand beside those who stand beside me, and I lift those who lift others.

To ride with whoever rides with you is not merely loyalty — it is reciprocal strength, the sacred law of community. It means: do not waste your light on those who despise its glow; instead, pour your love into those who honor it, into those who move through the world with kindness, courage, and purpose. Empowerment, then, is not an act of rebellion but of creation — the creation of a circle in which every woman’s triumph becomes the triumph of all.

This quote, though modern in tongue, is ancient in spirit. It recalls the matriarchs of old — the wise Deborah, the steadfast Ruth, the courageous Hatshepsut — women who knew that true power is shared, not hoarded. SZA’s voice carries that legacy into the new age, reminding us that every generation must reclaim the sacred art of lifting one another up. The battle for equality is not only fought in courts or councils, but in the heart of every conversation, every friendship, every moment where we choose understanding over envy, and respect over ridicule.

And so, dear listener, the lesson stands clear and strong: empower others, and you empower yourself. Speak words that heal, not harm. Celebrate the success of your sisters, for their rise lights the road ahead for all. Refuse to shrink others, and your own soul will expand. Remember that every act of encouragement is a spark — and together, those sparks become a blazing constellation of change.

Let this be the creed of all who would walk in wisdom: stand with those who stand with you, honor the divine power in every soul, and never be the hand that belittles, but always the voice that uplifts. For in the end, those who empower do not merely change others — they transform the world, one radiant heart at a time.