Meet Barbara Pamplin
author, speaker, and founder of Beautiful Powerful Love.
Barbara’s life was changed by 50, 3, and 3 - 50 days in ICU, 3 open heart surgeries, and 3 deaths and resuscitations.
According to the American Heart Association, 50,000 Black women die from heart disease every year. Barbara Pamplin was nearly one of them. In the fall of 2017. Pamplin survived an aortic dissection (which is 99% fatal), 3 open heart surgeries, and 3 deaths and resuscitations. The road that led her to the operating room, and nearly the morgue, was paved with inter-generational trauma from the effects of slavery and racial stereotypes. Fueled by gratitude and joy for living, Barbara decided to go beyond surviving to use her experience to help others through inspiration, storytelling, and education. As part of that process, she wrote a memoir and self-help book, From Fat, Black, and Unlovable to Beautiful Powerful Love. In this work, Barbara writes about her experiences, and documents the many behaviors and toxic beliefs that formed in her youth and persisted throughout her life. Her story is as remarkable and unique as it is familiar to many Black women.
Barbara Pamplin, author, speaker, and founder of Beautiful Powerful Love Photo Credit: Kariba Photography
“I stand for Black women who have survived a traumatic health crisis.”
Interested in booking Barbara for speaking engagements or workshops?
I speak to Black women at retreats and events organized by event planners, sororities, and nonprofit/community organizations
I speak to Black women who are members of ERGs at Corporations
I speak to healthcare professionals who serve Black women
Email us with your event details - connect@beautifulpowerfullove.com
Many Black women possess toxic self-beliefs that require transformation for emotional healing to occur. I believe that when Black women can look in the mirror and truly see ourselves as Beautiful, recognize that we are Powerful, and radiate the Love we seek, then we will have all that we need to heal ourselves, our families, our communities, and yes, the world.
— Barbara (Ohuninifa)
Beautiful Powerful Love was birthed from a longing to live and to give.
The Beautiful Powerful Love movement began in 2018 as a series of community events celebrating the upcoming release of The Book (released March 2019.) The events were held in partnership with Langston in Seattle, Washington, and were designed to engulf Black women, and our co-conspirators, in culturally relevant performances along with workshops in various healing art forms. The community gatherings offered opportunities to come together and begin to identify that which keeps Black women and our communities unwell.
These events evolved into a movement inspiring Black women to remember how love ourselves.
Our Mission is to empower Black women to confront misogynoir while inspiring personal and community transformation of the African diaspora.
Our Vision is a world where Black women and our families/communities are healed and thriving.
We Believe creative expression and gaining knowledge of self, are potent factors in personal transformation and intergenerational healing.
We Manifest this through community events, books, content, and experiences that inform, inspire, and revitalize Black women.
The inventiveness and resilience of the African diaspora, along with the authentic expression of our true selves, empowers us to free ourselves from the mental shackles of colonialism.
Together, we can heal through joy, beauty, and culture.