You Already Have Wings

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

What Frida Kahlo taught us about rising anyway

Has anyone ever looked at what you’re going through and decided before you even opened your mouth what you were capable of?

Maybe it was a teacher who saw your postcode before they saw your potential. A system that handed you obstacles and called them your fault. A voice in your own head that said, ‘Given everything you’re dealing with, who do you think you are?’

Frida Kahlo heard versions of that voice her whole life.

She answered it with paint. With colour. With a body of work so fierce and so honest that the world is still catching up with it nearly a century later.

And she did it all while carrying pain that would have stopped most people before they started.

“Feet, what do I need you for when I have wings to fly?” Frida Kahlo

She wasn’t supposed to.

At six years old, Frida contracted polio. At eighteen, she survived a near-fatal bus accident that shattered her spine, collarbone, ribs, and pelvis. She spent months in a full-body cast. Doctors told her she might never walk again.

She walked. And then she painted.

Not despite everything. Through everything. Her pain became her palette. Her identity – Mexican, disabled, queer, and unconventional – became the architecture of a body of work that galleries around the world now fight to house.

Frida didn’t wait for the world to make space for her. She picked up a brush and made her own.

That is not a metaphor. That is a decision. One she made again and again, in the face of circumstances that were genuinely, seriously hard.

What she’s really saying to you.

When Frida talks about wings, she’s not talking about ignoring the hard stuff. She went through too much for that to be her message. She’s talking about something harder and more honest than that.

She’s talking about the moment you realise that what’s been done to you, said to you, or taken from you does not get to decide what you do next.

Your circumstances are real. The barriers are real. The pain is real. Frida never pretended otherwise; her art is practically a document of everything she had to survive.

But so are the wings. And the wings were hers. No one could give them to her, and no one could take them away.

That’s the message. Not “everything will be fine.” Not “just believe in yourself.” But this: you are building something that your circumstances cannot touch. And the world needs to see it.

What the world gave Frida

The barriers

• Chronic, severe physical pain
• A world that didn’t value women artists
• Poverty and political upheaval
• Relationships that broke her heart
• A body that kept failing her

What Frida gave the world

The wings

• A new visual language for identity
• Permission to be complex and whole
• Art that made the invisible visible
• A blueprint for resilience without pretending
• One of the most iconic bodies of work in history

This is where BelEve comes in.

Frida had something a lot of girls today don’t: an unshakeable belief, from somewhere deep inside her, that her story was worth telling. That her perspective had value. That the world needed what she had even when the world hadn’t figured that out yet.

Not every girl starts there. And that’s not a failure; that’s a gap. A gap that safe spaces, mentors, and communities of belief can fill.

Because here’s what we know: when a girl is given the right environment, when someone shows up and says, “Your story matters; your voice belongs here; I see your wings even when you can’t,” something shifts. She stops asking for permission. She starts building.

86% of girls reported increased confidence after structured mentorship and safe space programmes. Youth Mentoring Studies, 2022–2023

That number represents girls who stopped waiting to be told they were enough. Girls who found their version of the paintbrush. Girls who started building wings.

BelEve doesn’t hand girls their wings. We create the spaces where they discover they already have them.

Give to Gain — what Frida’s story really means.

Frida Kahlo gave the world something it didn’t know it needed: an entirely new language for identity, pain, resilience, and beauty. She gave it without being asked. She gave it while she was hurting. She gave it in rooms that weren’t always ready to receive it.

And what did the world gain?

A way of seeing itself that didn’t exist before. A permission slip for every person who ever felt too complicated, too much, or too different for the spaces they were trying to enter. An artist whose work only grows more powerful with time.

When we give girls safe spaces, identity-affirming programmes, and consistent belief, that is what we are investing in. Not just confidence. Not just qualifications. A voice. A perspective. A contribution that the world hasn’t yet imagined but urgently needs.

Give to Gain

Give a girl a safe space to discover her wings. Give her mentors who believe in what she’s building. Give her the environment where her story can become her strength. Support BelEve This March

You don’t have to have it all figured out. Neither did she.

Frida didn’t start out knowing she would become one of the most celebrated artists in history. She started by being honest about her experience, refusing to make herself smaller, and picking up the brush anyway.

That is all she did. Over and over again.

Throughout March, we’re honouring every girl who is carrying something heavy and building something powerful at the same time. Every girl who has been told her circumstances are her ceiling. Every girl who is, quietly and bravely, choosing to fly anyway.

Your barriers are real. But so are your wings. We’ve always believed that.

Ready to find your wings?

Join a BelEve programme and find the safe space where your story becomes your strength. Find a Programme

Invest in what she’s building.

Your support gives a girl the environment she needs to discover what she’s capable of. Give this March. Support BelEve

More stories like this, all March long.

We’re honouring the women who paved the way and the girls building what comes next. Don’t miss a single story. Join the BelEve Community

— The BelEve UK Team