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I Don't Believe An Accident Of Birth Makes People Sisters Or Brothers. It Makes Them Siblings, Gives Them Mutuality Of Parentage. Sisterhood And Brotherhood Is A Condition People Have To Work At.

-Maya Angelou

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I Don't Believe An

Maya Angelou

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I Don't Believe An Accident Of Birth Makes People Sisters Or Brothers. It Makes Them Siblings, Gives Them Mutuality Of Parentage. Sisterhood And Brotherhood Is A Condition People Have To Work At.

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I Think A Number Of The Leaders Are, Whether You Like It Or Not, In The Hip-hop Generation. And When They Understand Enough, They'll Do Wonders. I Count On Them.

The Truth Is, No One Of Us Can Be Free Until Everybody Is Free.

My Encouragement To You Is To Go Tomorrow To The Library.

Those Who Have Something To Say Accept The Fact That That's Lonely. One Already Knows That There Will Be Adversaries.

It's In The Click Of My Heels, The Bend Of My Hair, The Palm Of My Hand, The Need Of My Care, 'cause I'm A Woman Phenomenally. Phenomenal Woman, That's Me.

We Need To Haunt The House Of History And Listen Anew To The Ancestors' Wisdom.

Words Of Wisdom

To Those Who Are Given Much, Much Is Expected.

You Forgive Yourself For Every Failure Because You Are Trying To Do The Right Thing. God Knows That And You Know It. Nobody Else May Know It.

I'm Working At Trying To Be A Christian And That's Serious Business. It's Like Trying To Be A Good Jew, A Good Muslim, A Good Buddhist, A Good Shintoist, A Good Zoroastrian, A Good Friend, A Good Lover, A Good Mother, A Good Buddyit's Serious Business. It's Not Something Where You Think, Oh, I've Got It Done. I Did It All Day, Hotdiggety. The Truth Is, All Day Long You Try To Do It, Try To Be It, And Then In The Evening If You're Honest And Have A Little Courage You Look At Yourself And Say, Hmm. I Only Blew It Eighty-six Times. Not Bad.

What Is A Fear Of Living? It's Being Preeminently Afraid Of Dying. It Is Not Doing What You Came Here To Do, Out Of Timidity And Spinelessness. The Antidote Is To Take Full Responsibility For Yourself - For The Time You Take Up And The Space You Occupy. If You Don't Know What You're Here To Do, Then Just Do Some Good.

Sometimes Guns Really Matter. Protecting Those Who Need Protection - Children, Women, Minorities In Rough Parts Of Town, Old Folks Living In Places Where Cops Aren't Nearby. Guns Are True Empowerment For The Powerless.

You Think You May Not Be Heard. Speak Anyway.

Politicians Must Set Their Aims For The High Ground And According To Our Various Leanings, Democratic, Republican, Independent, We Will Follow. Politicians Must Be Told If They Continue To Sink Into The Mud Of Obscenity, They Will Proceed Alone.

All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes.

When I Write, I Tend To Twist My Hair. Something For My Small Mind To Do, I Guess.

I've Learned That Every Day You Should Reach Out And Touch Someone. People Love A Warm Hug, Or Just A Friendly Pat On The Back.

Let The Brain Go To Work, Let It Meet The Heart And You Will Be Able To Forgive.

Some Of Us Are Timid. We Think We Have Something To Lose So We Don't Try For That Next Hill.

I've Never Had A Dislike For Men. I've Been Badly Treated By Some. But I've Been Loved Greatly By Some. I Married A Lot Of Them.

I Am Overwhelmed By The Grace And Persistence Of My People.

I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings.

There Is A Lot Of Ignorance, And I Don't Mean Intellectual Ignorance. I Mean People Think That If You Get Something, It Will Take Away From What I Have. It's Just Ignorance.

Words Mean More Than What Is Set Down On Paper. It Takes The Human Voice To Infuse Them With Deeper Meaning.

My Grandmother Told Me That Every Good Thing I Do Helps Some Human Being In The World. I Believed Her 50 Years Ago And Still Do.

When Women Take Care Of Their Health They Become Their Own Best Friend.

When Women Take Care Of Their Health They Become Their Own Best Friend.

The Woman Who Truly Intends To Live A Good Life Is Already Living Phenomenally Since Intent Is Part Of The Achievement.

By No Amount Of Agile Exercising Of A Wistful Imagination Could My Mother Have Been Called Lenient. Generous She Was; Indulgent Never. Kind, Yes, Permissive, Never. In Her World, People She Accepted Paddled Their Own Canoes, Pulled Their Own Weight, Put Their Own Shoulders To Their Own Plows And Pushed Like Hell.

Don't Face The Day Until You've Faced God.

Be Certain That You Do Not Die Without Having Done Something Wonderful For Humanity.

Inspirational Life

It’s The Fire In My Eyes, And The Flash Of My Teeth, The Swing In My Waist, And The Joy In My Feet. I’m A Woman Phenomenally.

I Refuse To Allow Any Man-made Differences To Separate Me From Any Other Human Beings.

Creativity Or Talent, Like Electricity, Is Something I Don’t Understand But Something I’m Able To Harness And Use. While Electricity Remains A Mystery, I Know I Can Plug Into It And Light Up A Cathedral Or A Synagogue Or An Operating Room And Use It To Help Save A Life. Or I Can Use It To Electrocute Someone. Like Electricity, Creativity Makes No Judgment. I Can Use It Productively Or Destructively. The Important Thing Is To Use It. You Can’t Use Up Creativity. The More You Use It, The More You Have.

This Is What I Am Learning, At 82 Years Old: The Main Thing Is To Be In Love With The Search For Truth.

When Younger Writers And Poets, Musicians And Painters Are Weakened By A Stemming Of Funds, They Come To Me Saddened, Not As Full Of Dreams And Excitement And Ideas. I Am Then Weakened And Diminished, And Made Less Rich.

Whenever Something Went Wrong When I Was Young - If I Had A Pimple Or If My Hair Broke - My Mom Would Say, 'sister Mine, I'm Going To Make You Some Soup.' And I Really Thought The Soup Would Make My Pimple Go Away Or My Hair Stronger.

To Be Human Is To Be Challenged To Be More Divine. Not Even To Try To Meet Such A Challenge Is The Biggest Defeat Imaginable.

I Believe What I Have To Say Is Important, And I Believe The People Coming To Hear Me Are Important, And So The Occasion Of Itself Alone Has An Importance, Which Forces Me To Stare Down My Nerves.

When We Give Cheerfully And Accept Gratefully, Everyone Is Blessed.

Without Willing It, I Had Gone From Being Ignorant Of Being Ignorant To Being Aware Of Being Aware. And The Worst Part Of My Awareness Was That I Didn't Know What I Was Aware Of. I Knew I Knew Very Little, But I Was Certain That The Things I Had Yet To Learn Wouldn't Be Taught To Me At George Washington High School.

Until Recently Each Generation Found It More Expedient To Plead Guilty To The Charge Of Being Young And Ignorant, Easier To Take The Punishment Meted Out By The Older Generation (which Had Itself Confessed To The Same Crime Short Years Before). The Command To Grow Up At Once Was More Bearable Than The Faceless Horror Of Wavering Purpose, Which Was Youth.

I Love Living. I Love That I'm Alive To Love My Age. There Are Many People Who Went To Bed Just As I Did Yesterday Evening And Didn't Wake This Morning. I Love And Feel Very Blessed That I Did. I Love, Too, That I Know A Little More Today Than I Did Yesterday, Or I Simply Know It More Profoundly.

We Can See, From California To New York, From Maine To Florida, Seattle To New Mexico - Everywhere There Are Women's Groups. Everywhere There Are Women Who Have Gotten Together To Examine Global Warming, And Women Who Have Gotten Together To Prepare Each Other For Single Parenting - There Are Women Who Have Come Together To Be Supportive To Those Whose Mates Are In Prison, Male Or Female, Partners Are In Prison. All Sorts Of Gatherings Of Women. I Mean, I'm Just Celebrating My 80th Year On This Planet, And I Look Back 50 Years Ago And There Was Nothing Like That.

Everybody Is Worth Everything.

I Think I Know That I Deserve Better. And So I Try For Better. I'm Never So Put Off That I Would Ever Walk Out Of A Place Not Having Tried The Best I Could.

I'm Working At Trying To Be A Christian And That's Serious Business. It's Like Trying To Be A Good Jew, A Good Muslim, A Good Buddhist, A Good Shintoist, A Good Zoroastrian, A Good Friend, A Good Lover, A Good Mother, A Good Buddyit's Serious Business. It's Not Something Where You Think, Oh, I've Got It Done. I Did It All Day, Hotdiggety. The Truth Is, All Day Long You Try To Do It, Try To Be It, And Then In The Evening If You're Honest And Have A Little Courage You Look At Yourself And Say, Hmm. I Only Blew It Eighty-six Times. Not Bad.

The Public Library Building, In My View, Is Just A Little Lower Than The Church, The Cathedral, The Temple, The Synagogue And The Mosque. Within Those Walls And Along Those Stacks, I Have Found Security And Assurance.

And One Of My Absolute Favorite Quotes Of All-time, One That I've Adopted As One Of My Greatest Life Mottos: Life Loves To Be Taken By The Lapel And Told: "i'm With You Kid. Let's Go."

Success Is Liking Yourself, Liking What You Do, And Liking How You Do It.

When I Try To Describe Myself To God I Say, 'lord, Remember Me? Black? Female? Six-foot Tall? The Writer?' And I Almost Always Get God's Attention.

In Diversity There Is Beauty And There Is Strength.

The Subject Of The Poem Usually Dictates The Rhythm Or The Rhyme And Its Form. Sometimes, When You Finish The Poem And You Think The Poem Is Finished, The Poem Says, "you're Not Finished With Me Yet," And You Have To Go Back And Revise, And You May Have Another Poem Altogether. It Has Its Own Life To Live.

Nature Has No Mercy At All. Nature Says, "i'm Going To Snow. If You Have On A Bikini And No Snowshoes, That's Tough. I Am Going To Snow Anyway."

Live Life As If It Were Created Just For You.

In The 16th Century, [niccolò] Machiavelli - In An Attempt To Get Back In The Good Graces Of The Powerful - Wrote A Slim Volume Called The Prince. In That Book He Showed The Powers That Be How To Control The People. That Book Is A Statement: Separate And Rule, Divide And Conquer. That's Five Hundred Years Ago And It Still Works, Because We Allow Ourselves To Be Lead Around With Holes Through Our Noses.

Human Beings Are More Alike Than Unalike, And What Is True Anywhere Is True Everywhere, Yet I Encourage Travel To As Many Destinations As Possible For The Sake Of Education As Well As Pleasure.

Hate, It Has Caused A Lot Of Problems In The World, But Has Not Solved One Yet.

If I'm Here, I'll Be Trying To Be A Better Human Being, A Better Writer, A Better Friend And A Better Beloved.

To Grow Up Is To Stop Putting Blame On Parents.

Human Beings Love Poetry. They Don't Even Know It Sometimes... Whether They're The Songs Of Bono, Or The Songs Of Justin Bieber... They're Listening To Poetry.

There's Something Which Impels Us To Show Our Inner Souls. The More Courageous We Are, The More We Succeed In Explaining What We Know.

We, Unaccustomed To Courage Exiles From Delight Live Coiled In Shells Of Loneliness Until Love Leaves Its High Holy Temple And Comes Into Our Sight To Liberate Us Into Life.

Depending On Who I Am Talking About Or Who's Talking Through Me - If The Person Is A Kind Of Hip-hop, Or Rhythm And Blues Person, Or If The Person Is A Kind Of Old-fashion Gothic, Meaning Gothic Attitude, Then That Will Determine What Form The Poem Will Take.

The Thing To Do, It Seems To Me, Is To Prepare Yourself So You Can Be A Rainbow In Somebody Else's Cloud. Somebody Who May Not Look Like You. May Not Call God The Same Name You Call God - If They Call God At All. I May Not Dance Your Dances Or Speak Your Language. But Be A Blessing To Somebody. That's What I Think.

We, Unaccustomed To Courage Exiles From Delight Live Coiled In Shells Of Loneliness Until Love Leaves Its High Holy Temple And Comes Into Our Sight To Liberate Us Into Life. Love Arrives And In Its Train Come Ecstasies Old Memories Of Pleasure Ancient Histories Of Pain. Yet If We Are Bold, Love Strikes Away The Chains Of Fear From Our Souls. We Are Weaned From Our Timidity In The Flush Of Love's Light We Dare Be Brave And Suddenly We See That Love Costs All We Are And Will Ever Be. Yet It Is Only Love Which Sets Us Free.

Depending On Who I Am Talking About Or Who's Talking Through Me - If The Person Is A Kind Of Hip-hop, Or Rhythm And Blues Person, Or If The Person Is A Kind Of Old-fashion Gothic, Meaning Gothic Attitude, Then That Will Determine What Form The Poem Will Take.

You Can't Use Up Creativity, Creative Thinking Builds On Itself And Increases The Creativity Of The Thinker...you Can't Use Up Creativity. The More You Use, The More You Have.

Until Blacks And Whites See Each Other As Brother And Sister, We Will Not Have Parity. It's Very Clear.

I'm Grateful To Be Of Use. I Will Not Be Misused Or Abused, But I Will Be Of Use To Anybody.

When You Wish Someone Joy, You Wish Them Peace, Love, Prosperity, Happiness... All The Good Things.

You Don't Have To Tell Everything You Know, But Let What You Do Say Be The Truth As You Understand It.

The Only Way You Can Be A Mark Is If You Want Something For Nothing. If You're Greedy, You're Set Up.

It Is This Belief In A Power Larger Than Myself And Other Than Myself Which Allows Me To Venture Into The Unknown And Even The Unknowable.

Having Courage Does Not Mean That We Are Unafraid. Having Courage And Showing Courage Mean We Face Our Fears. We Are Able To Say, 'i Have Fallen, But I Will Get Up.'

Difficult Is A Far Cry From Impossible. The Distance Between These Two Lies Hope. Hope And Fear Cannot Occupy The Same Space At The Same Time. Invite One To Stay.

I Always Knew From That Moment, From The Time I Found Myself At Home In That Little Segregated Library In The South, All The Way Up Until I Walked Up The Steps Of The New York City Library, I Always Felt, In Any Town, If I Can Get To A Library, I'll Be Okay. It Really Helped Me As A Child, And That Never Left Me. So I Have A Special Place For Every Library, In My Heart Of Hearts.

I Encourage You To Live With Life. Be Courageous, Adventurous. Give Us A Tomorrow, More Than We Deserve.

Anything That Works Against You Can Also Work For You Once You Understand The Principle Of Reverse.

Independence Is A Heady Draught, And If You Drink It In Your Youth, It Can Have The Same Effect On The Brain As Young Wine Does. It Does Not Matter That Its Taste Is Not Always Appealing. It Is Addictive And With Each Drink You Want More.

Human Beings Are More Alike Than Unalike, And What Is True Anywhere Is True Everywhere, Yet I Encourage Travel To As Many Destinations As Possible For The Sake Of Education As Well As Pleasure.

When We Come To It We Must Confess That We Are The Possible We Are The Miraculous, The True Wonders Of This World, That Is When, And Only When We Come To It

I Had To Trust Life And Believe That Life Loved The Person Who Dared To Live It.

When You Know You Are Of Worth, You Don't Have To Raise Your Voice, You Don't Have To Become Rude, You Don't Have To Become Vulgar; You Just Are. And You Are Like The Sky Is, As The Air Is, The Same Way Water Is Wet. It Doesn't Have To Protest.

The Needs Of A Society Determine Its Ethics, And In The Black American Ghettos The Hero Is That Man Who Is Offered Only The Crumbs From His Country's Table But By Ingenuity And Courage Is Able To Take For Himself A Lucullan Feast. Hence The Janitor Who Lives In One Room But Sports A Robin's-egg-blue Cadillac Is Not Laughed At But Admired, And The Domestic Who Buys Forty-dollar Shoes Is Not Criticized But Is Appreciated. We Know That They Have Put To Use Their Full Mental And Physical Powers. Each Single Gain Feeds Into The Gains Of The Body Collective.

If You Have Done The Best You Can Do And If You Have Gotten All You Could Extract From Something, You Have Given All You Had To Give, Then The Time Has Come When You Can Do No More Than Say Thank You And Move On.

Strong Women- Precious Jewels All- Their Humanness Is Evident In Their Accessibility. We Are Able To Enter Into The Spirit Of These Women And Rejoice In Their Warmth And Courage.

I Think All Poems Are Commissioned. They Just Come To Me Without Somebody Outside Commissioning Them. The Idea Comes And I Will Live With Them 'til I Get It As Close To What I Mean. I've Never Been Totally Satisfied. I've Come Close A Few Times.

Having Courage Does Not Mean We Are Unafraid.

Laugh And Dare To Try To Love Somebody, Starting With Yourself. You Must Love Yourself First, Of Course, And You Must Protect Yourself So That Nobody Overrides You, Overrules You, Or Steps On You. Just Say, 'just A Minute. I'm Worth Everything, Dear.'

Nothing Succeeds Like Success. Get A Little Success, And Then Just Get A Little More.

Everyone Grows Old But Not Everyone Grows Up.

I Write Because I Am A Black Woman, Listening Attentively To Her People.

Love Is Like A Virus. It Can Happen To Anybody At Any Time.

Each Of Us Has The Power And Responsibility To Become A Rainbow In The Clouds.

Let Me Tell So Much Truth. I Want To Tell The Truth In My Work. The Truth Will Lead Me To All.

Telling The Truth

I Believe We Are Still So Innocent. The Species Are Still So Innocent That A Person Who Is Apt To Be Murdered Believes That The Murderer, Just Before He Puts The Final Wrench On His Throat, Will Have Enough Compassion To Give Him One Sweet Cup Of Water.

I Am A Very Religious Person, So It Is The Presence Of God, The Constant Unwavering, Unrelenting Presence Of God Which Continues To Help Me To Keep A Character Which I Am Proud To Show.

Everybody Born Comes From The Creator Trailing Wisps Of Glory. We Come From The Creator With Creativity. I Think That Each One Of Us Is Born With Creativity.

I Am Not Competing With Anyone Other Than Myself. I Want To Be Excellent At Whatever I Do.

I Learned A Long Time Ago The Wisest Thing I Can Do Is Be On My Own Side, Be An Advocate For Myself And Others Like Me.

That's The Biggest Gift I Can Give Anybody: 'wake Up, Be Aware Of Who You Are, What You're Doing And What You Can Do To Prevent Yourself From Becoming Ill.'

The Fact That The Adult American Negro Female Emerges A Formidable Character Is Often Met With Amazement, Distaste And Even Belligerance. It Is Seldom Accepted As An Inevitable Outcome Of The Struggle Won By Survivors, And Deserves Respect If Not Enthusiastic Acceptance.

Just Like Moons And Suns, With Certainty Of Tides, Just Like Hopes Springing High, Still I'll Rise.

I Love The Melodies In The Old Testament, How Preachers Highlight Them When They Read From The Scripture. But I Was Influenced Forever By The New Testament. I Love The Beatitudes, Informing Us That The Meek Shall Inherit The Earth.

Being Thankful Helps You To Be Present.people Commit Errors Because They Are Not Present.i Would Encourage Women And Men To Be Present - You'll Avoid Falling Into Certain Pits.for Instance, If You Know That A Person Has Just Lost His Wife Or Her Husband Or Lover, It's Unlikely That You Will Say Something That Will Hurt That Person's Feelings If You're Truly Paying Attention. You'll Make A Sweeter Life For Yourself And For Those Around You If You Are Present.

I Am Serious, So I Laugh A Lot. You Need To Laugh. You Don't Laugh Enough. I Don't Trust Anyone Who Doesn't Laugh.

I Certainly Do Not Adore The Writer's Discipline. I Have Lost Lovers, Endangered Friendships, And Blundered Into Eccentricity, Impelled By A Concentration Which Usually Is To Be Found Only In The Minds Of People About To Be Executed In The Next Half Hour.

At One Time, You Could Sit On The Rue De La Paix In Paris Or At The Habima Theater In Tel Aviv Or In Medina And You Could See A Person Come In, Black, White, It Didn't Matter. You Said, 'that's An American' Because There's A Readiness To Smile And To Talk To People.

Every Person Needs To Take One Day Away. A Day In Which One Consciously Separates The Past From The Future.

Without Courage You Can't Practice Any Other Virtue Consistently.

The Root Cause Of All The Problems We Have In The World Today Is Ignorance Of Course. But Most, Polarization.

I Know Some People Might Think It Odd - Unworthy Even - For Me To Have Written A Cookbook, But I Make No Apologies. The U.s. Poet Laureate Billy Collins Thought I Had Demeaned Myself By Writing Poetry For Hallmark Cards, But I Am The People's Poet So I Write For The People.

Few, If Any, Survive Their Teens. Most Surrender To The Vague But Murderous Pressure Of Adult Conformity.

Mostly, What I Have Learned So Far About Aging, Despite The Creakiness Of One's Bones And Cragginess Of One's Once-silken Skin, Is This: Do It. By All Means, Do It.

At Our Best, We're All Teachers

I Am The Dream And The Hope Of The Slave

African American

Hold Those Things That Tell Your History And Protect Them. During Slavery, Who Was Able To Read Or Write Or Keep Anything? The Ability To Have Somebody To Tell Your Story To Is So Important. It Says: 'i Was Here. I May Be Sold Tomorrow. But You Know I Was Here.'

We Love And Lose In China, We Weep On England's Moors, And Laugh And Moan In Guinea, And Thrive On Spanish Shores. We Seek Success In Finland, Are Born And Die In Maine. In Minor Ways We Differ, In Major We're The Same.

The Writer Has To Take The Most Used, Most Familiar Objects - Nouns, Pronouns, Verbs, Adverbs - Ball Them Together And Make Them Bounce, Turn Them A Certain Way And Make People Get Into A Romantic Mood; And Another Way, Into A Bellicose Mood. I'm Most Happy To Be A Writer.

Those Of Us Who Submitted Or Surrendered Our Ideas And Dreams And Identities To The 'leaders' Must Take Back Our Rights, Our Identities, Our Responsibilities.

When I Love Somebody, I Like Him To Be Around; I Like Him To Take Me Out To Dinner; I Like To Look At The Sunset With Him. But If Not, I Love Him And I Hope He's Looking At The Same Sun I Am. Loving Someone Liberates The Lover As Well As The Beloved. And That Kind Of Love Comes With Age. Some Of This Wisdom Came To Me After I Was 50 Or 60.

There Is An Intimate Laughter To Be Found Only Among Friends

Inspirational Friendship

I Encourage Courtesy. To Accept Nothing Less Than Courtesy, And To Give Nothing Less Than Courtesy.

What You're Supposed To Do When You Don't Like A Thing Is Change It. If You Can't Change It, Change The Way You Think About It. Don't Complain.

Love Liberates. It Doesn't Just Hold - That's Ego. Love Liberates. It Doesn't Bind.

There Are Those Who Say That Poets Should Use Her And His Art To Change The World. I'd Agree With That, But I Think Everybody Should Do That. I Think The Chef And The Baker And The Candlestick Maker - I Think Everybody Should Be Hoping To Make It A Better World.

The Honorary Duty Of A Human Being Is To Love.

Human Beings Love Poetry. They Don't Even Know It Sometimes... Whether They're The Songs Of Bono, Or The Songs Of Justin Bieber... They're Listening To Poetry.

My Life Has Been One Great Big Joke, A Dance That's Walked A Song That's Spoke, I Laugh So Hard I Almost Choke When I Think About Myself.

Dr. [martin Luther] King Was A Human Being. He Had A Sense Of Humor Which Was Wonderful.

When Was The Last Time Anyone Ever Told You How Important You Are?

Anyone Of Us Can Be A Rainbow In Somebody's Clouds. I Want The University Of Cincinnati To Be A Rainbow In The Clouds. The University Of Cincinnati Is Really A Possibility Of Hope; It Is A Rainbow.

I Would Say You Might Encounter Many Defeats But You Must Never Be Defeated, Ever. In Fact, It Might Even Be Necessary To Confront Defeat. It Might Be Necessary, To Get Over It, All The Way Through It, And Go On. I Would Teach Her To Laugh A Lot. Laugh A Lot At The - And The Silliest Things And Be Very, Very Serious. I'd Teach Her To Love Life, I Can Bet You That.

I've Learned That You Shouldn't Go Through Life With A Catcher's Mitt On Both Hands; You Need To Be Able To Throw Something Back.

During Bad Circumstances, Which Is The Human Inheritance, You Must Decide Not To Be Reduced. You Have Your Humanity, And You Must Not Allow Anything To Reduce That. We Are Obliged To Know We Are Global Citizens. Disasters Remind Us We Are World Citizens, Whether We Like It Or Not.

Effective Action Is Always Unjust.

Whining Lets The Brute Know There's A Victim For Him In The Neighborhood!

At The End Of The Day People Won't Remember What You Said Or Did, They Will Remember How You Made Them Feel.

The End Of The Day

Every Journey Begins With A Single Step.

Modesty Is A Learned Affectation. It's No Good. Humility Is Great, Because Humility Says, 'there Was Someone Before Me. I'm Following In Somebody's Footsteps.'

I Married A Man Once And We Had Been Married Over A Year Before I Found He Preferred Potatoes. I Said, "i Didn't Know You Loved Potatoes." And He Said That Until He Was About 13, He Thought Rice Was Potato Seeds.

I Would Be Stupid Not To Be On My Own Side. But I'm A Human Being, Too. And I'm On The Side Of Human Beings, Rather Than On The Side Of Crocodiles.

To Be Human Is To Be Challenged To Be More Divine. Not Even To Try To Meet Such A Challenge Is The Biggest Defeat Imaginable.

If You Do Not Like Anything, Alter It. If You Can Not Change It, Adjust Your Mindset. Will Not Complain.

Though We Are Many, Each Of Us Is Achingly Alone, Piercingly Alone. Only When We Confess Our Confusion Can We Remember That He Was A Gift To Us And We Did Have Him. He Came To Us From The Creator, Trailing Creativity In Abundance. Despite The Anguish, His Life Was Sheathed In Mother Love, Family Love, And Survived And Did More Than That. He Thrived With Passion And Compassion, Humor And Style. We Had Him Whether We Know Who He Was Or Did Not Know, He Was Ours And We Were His.

Wouldn't Take Nothing For My Journey Now.

Inspirational Life

We May Encounter Many Defeats, But We Must Not Be Defeated. It May Even Be Necessary To Encounter The Defeat, So That We Can Know Who We Are.

If You Are Always Trying To Be Normal You Will Never Know How Amazing You Can Be.

Education Is A Process That Goes On 'til Death. The Moment You See Someone Who Knows She Has Found The One True Way, And Can Call All The Others False, Then You Know You're In The Company Of An Ignoramus.

Forgive Yourself - No One Else Will.

Forgive Yourself

Music Was My Refuge. I Could Crawl Into The Space Between The Notes And Curl My Back To Loneliness.

In A Long Meter Hymn, A Singer - They Call It 'lays Out A Line.' And Then The Whole Church Joins In In Repeating That Line. And They Form A Wall Of Harmony So Tight, You Can't Wedge A Pin Between It.

Life Loves The Liver Of It.

Poetry And Music Are The Best At The Highest Level Of The Human Mind. Out Of Poetry, Out Of Their Need For Poetry, Human Beings Have Developed The Idea Of God. And So When We Sing, When We Dance, When We Speak Poetry We Are Speaking Out Of God's Mouth, Each Other Out Of The Music From God's Heart.

People Trying To Separate People Rather Than Bring Us Together... Please. You Don't Just See It In America. It's All Over The World.

Don't Let Anybody Raise You. You've Been Raised.

There Is No Place Where God Is Not.

When Things Were Very Bad His Soul Just Crawled Behind His Heart And Curled Up And Went To Sleep

Life Loves The Liver Of It. You Must Live And Life Will Be Good To You.

No One Can Take The Place Of A Friend, No One.

I, With Millions Of Other Americans, Have The Same Dream Martin Luther King Jr. Had; When I Wake Up I Wish Some Of The Things I Dreamt Would Be True. I Wish That Little Black And White Boys And Girls Would Hold Hands Without Being Shocked At Their Nearness To Each Other And Say In A Natural Way, "we Have Overcome.

Some Think, "if I Marry This Guy Who's Two Inches Taller Than I Am And Who Has A Nice Bank Account, I Won't Die. If I Buy Six Cars, I Won't Die. If I Hate Jews, I Won't Die. If I Hate Homosexuals, I Won't Die." They Think They Will Increase Their Life By Shunting Misery Onto Somebody Else, But It's Just The Opposite.

Hope Is Born Again In The Faces Of Children.

Have A Purpose To Your Life: Purpose Does Not Mean Having A Job...you Can Have A Job And Still Be Unfulfilled.

I've Always Written. There's A Journal Which I Kept From About 9 Years Old. The Man Who Gave It To Me Lived Across The Street From The Store And Kept It When My Grandmother's Papers Were Destroyed. I'd Written Some Essays. I Loved Poetry, Still Do. But I Really, Really Loved It Then.

It Is Imperative That Young White Men And Women Study The Black American History. It Is Imperative That Blacks And Whites Study The Asian American History.

All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes.

When I'm Writing, I Am Trying To Find Out Who I Am, Who We Are, What We're Capable Of, How We Feel, How We Lose And Stand Up, And Go On From Darkness Into Darkness.

I Don't Trust Any Revolution Where Love Is Not Allowed.

When Someone Shows You Who They Are, Believe Them The First Time. People Know Themselves Much Better Than You Do. That's Why It's Important To Stop Expecting Them To Be Something Other Than Who They Are

I Think That That's The Wisest Thing - To Prevent Illness Before We Try To Cure Something.

Be Present In All Things And Thankful For All Things.

I Think We Ought To Give Ourselves More Time. We Should Be More Patient With Ourselves And With Each Other.

If You Have Only One Smile In You, Give It To The People You Love. Don't Be Surly At Home, Then Go Out In The Street And Start Grinning 'good Morning' At Total Strangers.

I Don't Think Modesty Is A Very Good Virtue, If It Is A Virtue At All. A Modest Person Will Drop The Modesty In A Minute. It's A Learned Affectation.

For Africa To Me... Is More Than A Glamorous Fact. It Is A Historical Truth. No Man Can Know Where He Is Going Unless He Knows Exactly Where He Has Been And Exactly How He Arrived At His Present Place.

Don't Let The Incidents Which Take Place In Life Bring You Low. And Certainly Don't Whine. You Can Be Brought Low, That's Ok, But Don't Be Reduced By Them. Just Say, 'that's Life.'

My People Had Used Music To Soothe Slavery's Torment Or To Propitiate God, Or To Describe The Sweetness Of Love And The Distress Of Lovelessness, But I Knew No Race Could Sing And Dance Its Way To Freedom.

The Breezes Of The West African Night Were Intimate And Shy, Licking The Hair, Sweeping Through Cotton Dresses With Unseemly Intimacy, Then Disappearing Into The Utter Blackness.

I Find It Interesting That The Meanest Life, The Poorest Existence, Is Attributed To God's Will, But As Human Beings Become More Affluent, As Their Living Standard And Style Begin To Ascend The Material Scale, God Descends The Scale Of Responsibility At Commensurate Speed.

I Long, As Does Every Human Being, To Be At Home Wherever I Find Myself.

Any Book That Helps A Child To Form A Habit Of Reading, To Make Reading One Of His Deep And Continuing Needs, Is Good For Him.

The Happy Heart Runs With The River, Floats On The Air, Lifts To The Music, Soars With The Eagle, Hopes With The Prayer.

Talent Is Like Electricity. We Don't Understand Electricity. We Use It.

God Puts Rainbows In The Clouds So That Each Of Us - In The Dreariest And Most Dreaded Moments - Can See A Possibility Of Hope.

Chasing Rainbows

There Is An Intimate Laughter To Be Found Only Among Friends

Inspirational Friendship

I’m Grateful For Being Here, For Being Able To Think, For Being Able To See, For Being Able To Taste, For Appreciating Love – For Knowing That It Exists In A World So Rife With Vulgarity, With Brutality And Violence, And Yet Love Exists. I’m Grateful To Know That It Exists.

There Is No Greater Agony Than Bearing An Untold Story Inside You.

You Might Encounter Defeats But You Must Never Be Defeated... Love A Lot. Laugh A Lot At The Silliest Things And Be Very Serious... Love Life.

One Must Learn To Care For Oneself First, So That One Can Then Dare To Care For Someone Else.

Whatever You Want To Do, If You Want To Be Great At It, You Have To Love It And Be Able To Make Sacrifices For It.

The Loss Of Young First Love Is So Painful That It Borders On The Ludicrous.

We Grow Despite The Horror That We Feed Upon Our Own Tomorrow. We Grow.

I Think A Nap Or A Rest Overnight Is Great. But Who Needs Three Days Of Rest? Please! The Second Day, You Might Die.

If Somebody Is Really Trying To Take Your Head Off With A Baseball Bat - I Don't Know How Long You're Supposed To Stand There And Turn The Other Cheek, So He Or She Can Get A Better Angle At Taking Your Head Off.

One Must Know Not Just How To Accept A Gift, But With What Grace To Share It.

People Are Too Busy Putting Things Under Microscopes And So Forth. Creativity Is Greater Than The Sum Of Its Parts.

No Not Me Go Find Someone Else To Bring Down

The Real Difficulty Is To Overcome How You Think About Yourself.

Love Liberates. Love - Not Sentimentality, Not Mush - But True Love Gives You Enough Courage That You Can Say To Somebody, "don't Do That, Baby." And The Person Will Know You're Not Preaching But Teaching.

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Joseph A. Schumpeter

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