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If You Have A Napkin, You Need Another Napkin To Receive Back All The Blessings You'll Get. And You Keep Giving. Then You Need A Towel To Receive All The Gifts. And You Continue Giving. Finally, You Need A Tablecloth. And You Continue Giving - Not Stupidly, But You Give. And When You Give, You Finally Have To Move Out And Get A Second House, And A Third House And A Fourth.it Is A No - Fail, Incontrovertible Reality: If You Get, Give. If You Learn, Teach. You Can't Do Anything With That Except Do It.

-Maya Angelou

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If You Have A

Maya Angelou

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If You Have A Napkin, You Need Another Napkin To Receive Back All The Blessings You'll Get. And You Keep Giving. Then You Need A Towel To Receive All The Gifts. And You Continue Giving. Finally, You Need A Tablecloth. And You Continue Giving - Not Stupidly, But You Give. And When You Give, You Finally Have To Move Out And Get A Second House, And A Third House And A Fourth.it Is A No - Fail, Incontrovertible Reality: If You Get, Give. If You Learn, Teach. You Can't Do Anything With That Except Do It.

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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.

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

All My Work, My Life, Everything I Do Is About Survival, Not Just Bare, Awful, Plodding Survival, But Survival With Grace And Faith. While One May Encounter Many Defeats, One Must Not Be Defeated.

I Come As One, But Stand As 10,000.

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.'

I Live In An Atmosphere Of Music.

By Love I Don't Mean Indulgence. I Do Not Mean Sentimentality. And In This Instance, I Don't Even Mean Romance. I Mean That Condition That Allowed Humans To Dream Of God.that Condition That Allowed The "dumb" To Write Spirituals And Russian Songs And Irish Lilts. That Is Love, And It's So Much Larger Than Anything I Can Conceive.

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

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.

The Most Called-upon Prerequisite Of A Friend Is An Accessible Ear.

You May Write Me Down In History With Your Bitter, Twisted Lies. You May Trod Me In The Very Dirt, But Still Like Dust, I'll Rise.

It's Hard Because People Think They Have Something To Lose And The Truth Is They Have Everything To Gain In Trying To Love Somebody.

I Am Grateful To Have Been Loved And To Be Loved Now And To Be Able To Love, Because That Liberates. Love Liberates. It Doesn't Just Hold - That's Ego. Love Liberates. It Doesn't Bind. Love Says, 'i Love You. I Love You If You're In China. I Love You If You're Across Town. I Love You If You're In Harlem. I Love You. I Would Like To Be Near You. I'd Like To Have Your Arms Around Me. I'd Like To Hear Your Voice In My Ear. But That's Not Possible Now, So I Love You. Go.'

It Is A No-fail, Incontrovertible Reality: If You Get, Give. If You Learn, Teach. You Can't Do Anything With That Except Do It.

Of Course, There Are Those Critics - New York Critics As A Rule - Who Say, 'well, Maya Angelou Has A New Book Out And Of Course It's Good But Then She's A Natural Writer.' Those Are The Ones I Want To Grab By The Throat And Wrestle To The Floor Because It Takes Me Forever To Get It To Sing. I Work At The Language.

We Are The Victims Of The World's Most Comprehensive Robbery. Life Demands A Balance. It's All Right If We Do A Little Robbing Now.

It Is Only Out Of Ignorance That People Are Cruel, Because They Really Don't Think It Will Come Back.

Reality Has Changed Chameleonlike Before My Eyes So Many Times That I Have Learned, Or Am Learning, To Trust Almost Anything Except What Appears To Be So.

She Comprehended The Perversity Of Life, That In The Struggle Lies The Joy.

A Joyful Spirit Is Evidence Of A Grateful Heart.

Because Of Our Routines We Forget That Life Is An Ongoing Adventure.

Achievement Brings Its Own Anticlimax.

Loving Someone Liberates The Lover As Well As The Beloved. And That Kind Of Love Comes With Age.

I've Lived Many Places On The Planet, And I Still Have Friends In Many Places.

You May Shoot Me With Your Words, You May Cut Me With Your Eyes, You May Kill Me With Your Hatefulness, But Still, Like Air, I'll Rise!

Then The Question Began To Live Under My Blankets: How Did Lesbianism Begin? What Were The Symptoms? The Public Library Gave Information On The Finished Lesbian--and That Woefully Sketchy--but On The Growth Of A Lesbian, There Was Nothing. I Did Discover That The Difference Between Hermaphrodites And Lesbians Was That Hermaphrodites Were "born That Way." It Was Impossible To Determine Whether Lesbians Budded Gradually, Or Burst Into Being With A Suddenness That Dismayed Them As Much As It Repelled Society.

Eating Is So Intimate. It's Very Sensual. When You Invite Someone To Sit At Your Table And You Want To Cook For Them, You're Inviting A Person Into Your Life.

In Order To Be A Mentor, And An Effective One, One Must Care. You Must Care. You Don't Have To Know How Many Square Miles Are In Idaho, You Don't Need To Know What Is The Chemical Makeup Of Chemistry, Or Of Blood Or Water. Know What You Know And Care About The Person, Care About What You Know And Care About The Person You're Sharing With.

Everyone Grows Old But Not Everyone Grows Up.

The Charitable Say In Effect, 'i Seem To Have More Than I Need And You Seem To Have Less Than You Need. I Would Like To Share My Excess With You.' Fine, If My Excess Is Tangible, Money Or Goods, And Fine If Not, For I Learned That To Be Charitable With Gestures And Words Can Bring Enormous Joy And Repair Injured Feelings.

I'm A Religious Woman. And I Feel I Have Responsibility. I Have No Modesty At All. I'm Even Afraid Of It - It's A Learned Affectation And It's Just Stuck On Me Like Decals.

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I'm Not Sure If Resilience Is Ever Achieved Alone. Experience Allows Us To Learn From Example. But If We Have Someone Who Loves Us-i Don't Mean Who Indulges Us, But Who Loves Us Enough To Be On Our Side-then It's Easier To Grow Resilience, To Grow Belief In Self, To Grow Self-esteem. And It's Self-esteem That Allows A Person To Stand Up.

Inscribed On The Temple Of Apollo

Self Confidence

The Most Difficult Thing In The World, It Seems To Me, Is To Realize That I Am A Child Of God; To Keep That In My Mind All The Time.

The Dread Of Futility Has Been My Life-long Plague.

Each Of Us Needs To Withdraw From The Cares Which Will Not Withdraw From Us. We Need Hours Of Aimless Wandering Or Spates Of Time Sitting On Park Benches, Observing The Mysterious World Of Ants And The Canopy Of Treetops.

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.

The Most Important Thing I Can Tell You About Aging Is This: If You Really Feel That You Want To Have An Off-the-shoulder Blouse And Some Big Beads And Thong Sandals And A Dirndl Skirt And A Magnolia In Your Hair, Do It. Even If You're Wrinkled.

Forgive Yourself - No One Else Will.

Forgive Yourself

I've Learned That Whenever I Decide Something With An Open Heart, I Usually Make The Right Decision.

Be Wary When A Naked Person Offers You His Shirt

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.

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The Thorn From The Bush One Has Planted, Nourished And Pruned Pricks More Deeply And Draws More Blood.

Only Equals Make Friends, Every Other Relationship Is Contrived And Off Balance.

I Like To Know What's Happening.

Shelter Network's Programs And Services Are A Rainbow In The Clouds For Homeless Children And Adults.

I Don't Think There's Such A Thing As Autobiographical Fiction. If I Say It Happened, It Happened, Even If Only In My Mind.

If I'm The People's Poet, Then I Ought To Be In People's Hands - And, I Hope, In Their Heart.

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I Have Enough Of Life In Me To Make Somebody Jealous Enough To Want To Knock Me Down. I Have So Much Courage In Me That I Have The Effrontery, The Incredible Gall To Stand Up. That's It. That's How You Get To Know Who You Are.

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Easy Reading Is Damn Hard Writing. But If It's Right, It's Easy. It's The Other Way Round, Too. If It's Slovenly Written, Then It's Hard To Read. It Doesn't Give The Reader What The Careful Writer Can Give The Reader.

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Loving Someone Liberates The Lover As Well As The Beloved. And That Kind Of Love Comes With Age.

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

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.

To Be Left Alone On The Tightrope Of Youthful Unknowing Is To Experience The Excruciating Beauty Of Full Freedom And The Threat Of Eternal Indecision.

A Societies Needs Determines Their Ethics

You Are The Sum Total Of Everything You've Ever Seen, Heard, Eaten, Smelled, Been Told, Forgot - It's All There. Everything Influences Each Of Us, And Because Of That I Try To Make Sure That My Experiences Are Positive.

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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.

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.'

Lift Up Your Eyes Upon This Day Breaking For You. Give Birth Again To The Dream. Women, Children, Men, Take It Into The Palms Of Your Hands. Mold It Into The Shape Of Your Most Private Need. Sculpt It Into The Image Of Your Most Public Self. Lift Up Your Hearts Each New Hour Holds New Chances For A New Beginning.

Among Other Things, I'm Thinking "i'm A Child Of God." That's Amazing. And "i'm Not Only A Child Of God, But God Loves Me." The Hardest Part For Me Is To Realize That While God Loves Me, And I Am A Child Of God, I Have To See The Bigot And The Brute And The Rapist, And Whether He Or She Knows It Or Not, I Have To Know That That Person Is A Child Of God. That Is Part Of The Responsibility - And It's Hard.

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

I Would Welcome A Friendship With Lynne Hinton. I Would Welcome An Invitation To Sit Down At Her Table, But Mostly I Would Welcome Her Next Book.

Nothing Hurts More Than Realizing They Meant Everything To You, But You Meant Nothing To Them.

Never Whine. Whining Lets A Brute Know That A Victim Is In The Neighborhood.

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.

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.

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

Timidity Makes A Person Modest. It Makes Him Or Her Say, "i'm Not Worthy Of Being Written Up In The Record Of Deeds In Heaven Or On Earth." Timidity Keeps People From Their Good. They Are Afraid To Say, "yes, I Deserve It."

I Did What I Knew.. When I Knew Better, I Did Better

The World Had Taken A Deep Breath And Was Having Doubts About Continuing To Revolve.

Today, The First & Last Of Every Tree/ Speaks To Humankind. Come To Me, Here Beside The River.

Rainbows Are People Whose Lives Are Bright, Shining Examples For Others.

When I Passed Forty I Dropped Pretense, 'cause Men Like Women Who Got Some Sense.

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.

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.

I Speak A Number Of Languages, But None Are More Beautiful To Me Than English.

Women Should Be Tough, Tender, Laugh As Much As Possible, And Live Long Lives.

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.

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

If We Are Bold, Love Strikes Away The Chains Of Fear From Our Souls.

The Most Called-upon Prerequisite Of A Friend Is An Accessible Ear.

Give Yourself Time Just To Be With Yourself.

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.

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.

It Is Impossible To Struggle For Civil Rights, Equal Rights For Blacks, Without Including Whites. Because Equal Rights, Fair Play, Justice, Are All Like The Air: We All Have It, Or None Of Us Has It. That Is The Truth Of It.

Love Is Many Things. It Is Varied. One Thing Love Is Not, Is Unsure.

If Our Children Are To Approve Of Themselves, They Must See That We Approve Of Ourselves.

Let Gratitude Be The Pillow Upon Which You Kneel To Say Your Nightly Prayer. And Let Faith Be The Bridge You Build To Overcome Evil And Welcome Good.

All People In The World - Who Are Not Hermits Or Mutes - Speak Words. They Speak Different Languages, But They Speak Words. They Say, "how Are You" Or "i'm Not Feeling Well" All Over The World. These Common Words - These Common Elements That We Have Between Us - The Writer Has To Take Some Verbs And Nouns And Pronouns And Adjectives And Adverbs And Arrange Them In A Way That Sound Fresh.

I Do Hope That Young Men And Women Will Start To Think For Themselves And Start To Take Responsibility For Their Own Thoughts.

'god Put The Rainbow In The Clouds, Not Just In The Sky'... It Is Wise To Realize We Already Have Rainbows In Our Clouds, Or We Wouldn't Be Here. If The Rainbow Is In The Clouds, Then In The Worst Of Time, There Is The Possibility Of Seeing Hope... We Can Say 'i Can Be A Rainbow In The Cloud For Someone Yet To Be.' That May Be Our Calling.

To Grow Up Is To Stop Putting Blame On Parents.

I Might Have It At Six-fifteen A.m. Just As Soon As I Get In, But Usually It's About Eleven O'clock When I'll Have A Glass Of Sherry.

I Not Only Have The Right To Stand Up For Myself, But I Have The Responsibility. I Can't Ask Somebody Else To Stand Up For Me If I Won't Stand Up For Myself. And Once You Stand Up For Yourself, You'd Be Surprised That People Say, "can I Be Of Help?".

I've Learned That Whenever I Decide Something With An Open Heart, I Usually Make The Right Decision. I've Learned That Even When I Have Pains, I Don't Have To Be One. 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. I've Learned That I Still Have A Lot To Learn.

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.

Most Plain Girls Are Virtuous Because Of The Scarcity Of Opportunity To Be Otherwise.

I Am A Child Of God. I Always Carry That With Me.

A Wise Woman Wishes To Be No One's Enemy; A Wise Woman Refuses To Be Anyone's Victim.

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.

When You Learn, Teach, When You Get, Give.

Anger Is Like Fire. It Burns All Clean.

I Am Convinced That Courage Is The Most Important Of All The Virtues. Because Without Courage, You Cannot Practice Any Other Virtue Consistently. You Can Be Kind For A While; You Can Be Generous For A While; You Can Be Just For A While, Or Merciful For A While, Even Loving For A While. But It Is Only With Courage That You Can Be Persistently And Insistently Kind And Generous And Fair.

I Am Capable Of What Every Other Human Is Capable Of. This Is One Of The Great Lessons Of War And Life.

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.

I Try To Live What I Consider A "poetic Existence." That Means I Take Responsibility For The Air I Breathe And The Space I Take Up. I Try To Be Immediate, To Be Totally Present For All My Work.

I Believe In Living A Poetic Life, An Art Full Life. Everything We Do From The Way We Raise Our Children To The Way We Welcome Our Friends Is Part Of A Large Canvas We Are Creating.

Inspirational Life

We Are All Creative, But By The Time We Are Three Of Four Years Old, Someone Has Knocked The Creativity Out Of Us. Some People Shut Up The Kids Who Start To Tell Stories. Kids Dance In Their Cribs, But Someone Will Insist They Sit Still. By The Time The Creative People Are Ten Or Twelve, They Want To Be Like Everyone Else.

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 Have Need Of A Friend. There Is One And Only One Who Will Give The Air From His Failing Lungs For My Body's Mend. And That One Is My Love.

If You Happen To Fall In Love With Someone In Another Race, It's More Difficult, Because You Have To Translate Yourself.

Falling In Love

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."

Something Made Greater By Ourselves And In Turn That Makes Us Greater.

Living A Life Is Like Constructing A Building: If You Start Wrong, You'll End Wrong.

One Isn't Necessarily Born With Courage, But One Is Born With Potential. Without Courage, We Cannot Practice Any Other Virtue With Consistency. We Can't Be Kind, True, Merciful, Generous, Or Honest.

Live Life As If It Were Created Just For You.

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

You Have To Have Courage To Love Somebody. Because You Risk Everything. Everything.

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

I Think We Have Systematically And Critically Harmed Ourselves And Many Young People By Advising Them Not To Try Things.

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

Just As Hope Rings Through Laughter, It Can Also Shine Through Tears.

If The Door Has Been Opened And I've Been Invited, Or If I'm Not Invited And I Somehow Know I'm Supposed To Go In There, I Put Myself Together And Go In, Praying All The While. I Try To Learn Something Before I Go In. I Try To Show Some Respect Of The Place I'm Going Into.

Original Thinking Migrates Each Day In Search Of Nourishment.

Take A Day To Heal From The Lies You've Told Yourself And The Ones That Have Been Told To You.

A Person Is The Product Of Their Dreams. So Make Sure To Dream Great Dreams. And Then Try To Live Your Dream.

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

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.

At 50, I Began To Know Who I Was. It Was Like Waking Up To Myself.

I'm A Feminist. I've Been A Female For A Long Time Now. It'd Be Stupid Not To Be On My Own Side.

People Feel Guilty. And Guilt Is Stymieing. Guilt Immobilizes. Guilt Closes The Air Ducts And The Veins, And Makes People Ignorant.

I Am Always Talking About The Human Condition And About American Society In Particular: What It Is Like To Be Human, What Makes Us Weep, What Makes Us Fall And Stumble And Somehow Rise And Go On From Darkness Into Darkness And That Darkness Carpeted.

We Must Be Warriors In The Struggle Against Ignorance

Everyone Has At Least One Story, And Each Of Us Is Funny If We Admit It. You Have To Admit You're The Funniest Person You've Ever Heard Of.

If We All Hold On To The Mistake, We Can't See Our Own Glory In The Mirror Because We Have The Mistake Between Our Faces And The Mirror; We Can't See What We're Capable Of Being. You Can Ask Forgiveness Of Others, But In The End The Real Forgiveness Is In One's Own Self.

When Members Of A Society Wish To Secure That Society's Rich Heritage They Cherish Their Arts And Respect Their Artists. The Esteem With Which We Regard The Multiple Cultures Offered In Our Country Enhances Our Possibilities For Healthy Survival And Continued Social Development.

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

Words Of Wisdom

If We All Hold On To The Mistake, We Can't See Our Own Glory In The Mirror Because We Have The Mistake Between Our Faces And The Mirror; We Can't See What We're Capable Of Being. You Can Ask Forgiveness Of Others, But In The End The Real Forgiveness Is In One's Own Self.

Intelligence Is A Separate Gift, For The Benefit Of Students, So That They May Think Of Themselves As Intellectual And Not Very Intelligent, Or Intelligent And Not Very Intellectual. One Hopes, Of Course, That They Try To Bring The Two Virtues, The Two Elements, Into Their Lives At The Same Time.

I Also Wear A Hat Or A Very Tightly Pulled Head Tie When I Write. I Suppose I Hope By Doing That I Will Keep My Brains From Seeping Out Of My Scalp And Running In Great Gray Blobs Down My Neck, Into My Ears, And Over My Face.

Writing And Cookery Are Just Two Different Means Of Communication.

Freedom Is Never Free.

Still, When It Looked Like The Sun Wasn't Going To Shine Anymore, God Put A Rainbow In The Clouds.

I Can Be Changed By What Happens To Me. But I Refuse To Be Reduced By It.

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.

You Can Never Go Home Again, But The Truth Is You Can Never Leave Home, So It's All Right.

To Those Who Are Given Much, Much Is Expected.

And If A Person Is Religious, I Think It's Good, It Helps You A Bit. But If You're Not, At Least You Can Have The Sense That There Is A Condition Inside You Which Looks At The Stars With Amazement And Awe.

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

I Come As One, But Stand As 10,000.

We Write For The Same Reason That We Walk, Talk, Climb Mountains Or Swim The Oceans - Because We Can. We Have Some Impulse Within Us That Makes Us Want To Explain Ourselves To Other Human Beings.

In Today's Climate In Our Country, Which Is Sickened With The Pollution Of Pollution, Threatened With The Prominence Of Aids, Riddled With Burgeoning Racism, Rife With Growing Huddles Of The Homeless, We Need Art And We Need Art In All Forms. We Need All Methods Of Art To Be Present, Everywhere Present, And All The Time Present.

In A World So Rife With Vulgarity, With Brutality And Violence, Love Exists. I’m Grateful To Know That It Exists.

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.

You Have To Deal With What You Encounter. But You Must Not Be Reduced. And So A Way Not To Be Reduced Is Don't Whine! Don't Let The Incidents Which Take Place In Life Bring You Low.

Intelligence Always Had A Pornographic Influence On Me.

One Isn't Necessarily Born With Courage, But One Is Born With Potential.

Poetry Helps My Soul Escape Its Encasement.

There Is No Place Where God Is Not.

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.

We Are Growing Up. We Are Growing Up! Out Of The Idiocies - The Ignorances Of Racism And Sexism And Ageism And All Those Ignorances.

On The Day Of Your Birth, The Creator Filled Countless Storehouses, Set Aside For Your Use And Yours Alone.

The Woman Who Survives Intact And Happy Must Be At Once Tender And Tough.

If Men Are God's Gift To Women, Then God Must Really Love Gag Gifts.

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

We Have To Confront Ourselves. Do We Like What We See In The Mirror? And, According To Our Light, According To Our Understanding, According To Our Courage, We Will Have To Say Yea Or Nay - And Rise!

Light And Shadow Are Opposite Sides Of The Same Coin. We Can Illuminate Our Paths Or Darken Our Way. It Is A Matter Of Choice.

I Want To Be A Good Human Being. I'm Doing My Best, And I'm Working At It.

Today, The First & Last Of Every Tree/ Speaks To Humankind. Come To Me, Here Beside The River.

Life Sometimes Gives You A Second Chance.

All Great Achievements Require Time.

Now, After Years Of Observation And Enough Courage To Admit What I Have Observed, I Try To Plant Peace If I Do Not Want Discord; To Plant Loyalty And Honesty If I Want To Avoid Betrayal And Lies.

To Those Who Have Given Up On Love: I Say, "trust Life A Little Bit.

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.

Be Courageous, But Not Foolhardy. Walk Proud As You Are.

Because Of The Routines We Follow, We Often Forget That Life Is An Ongoing Adventure. . . Life Is Pure Adventure, And The Sooner We Realize That, The Quicker We Will Be Able To Treat Life As Art: To Bring All Our Energies To Each Encounter, To Remain Flexible Enough To Notice And Admit When What We Expected To Happen Did Not Happen. We Need To Remember That We Are Created Creative And Can Invent New Scenarios As Frequently As They Are Needed.

Out Of The Huts Of History's Shame I Rise Up From A Past That's Rooted In Pain I Rise I'm A Black Ocean, Leaping And Wide, Welling And Swelling I Bear In The Tide. Leaving Behind Nights Of Terror And Fear I Rise Into A Daybreak That's Wondrously Clear I Rise Bringing The Gifts That My Ancestors Gave, I Am The Dream And The Hope Of The Slave. I Rise I Rise I Rise.

Love Is A Condition So Powerful; It May Be That Which Pulls The Stars In The Firmament. It May Be That Which Pushes And Urges The Blood In The Veins. Courage: You Have To Have Courage To Love Somebody Because You Risk Everything-ever Ything.

My Mother Raised Me, And Then Freed Me.

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

When My Grandmother Died, I Realized That Even If I Had Millions Of Dollars, I Couldn't Find Her Anywhere On Earth. My Next Thought Was That I Would Die. I Looked At My Life And Thought, "i'm Afraid To Die." I Concluded That Whether I Was Afraid Or Not, I Would Die. It Was One Of The Most Important Crossroads In My Life, Once I Realized That No Matter What, I Would Do This Thing, The Next Step Was To Think, "if I Am Going To Do The Most Difficult And Frightening Thing - Dying - Is It Possible That I Could Do Some Difficult And Impossible Things That Are Good?"

Impossible Things

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Lawrence Kasdan

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