One key to progress in life is to find a giant on whose shoulders you can perch yourself. This can take the form of a formal mentor-mentee relationship, or it can even take the less formal form of studying the giant’s life and modeling your life in line with theirs.
The principle is that we can learn and we ought to learn from other people, especially those that have gone before us and navigated some of the challenges that we face. One such giant in contemporary times is Maya Angelou.