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The Truth Is You Never Can Leave Home. You Take It With You Everywhere You Go. It's Under Your Skin. It Moves The Tongue Or Slows It, Colors The Thinking, Impedes Upon The Logic.

-Maya Angelou

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The Truth Is You

Maya Angelou

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The Truth Is You Never Can Leave Home. You Take It With You Everywhere You Go. It's Under Your Skin. It Moves The Tongue Or Slows It, Colors The Thinking, Impedes Upon The Logic.

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I Suggest That The Great Art Belongs To All People, All The Time--that Indeed It Is Made For The People, By The People, To The People.

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.

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

You Can Only Become Great At Something You Are Willing To Sacrifice For

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. So That We Can See, "oh, That Happened, And I Rose. I Did Get Knocked Down Flat In Front Of The Whole World, And I Rose. I Didn't Run Away; I Rose Right Where I'd Been Knocked Down." That's How You Get To Know Yourself.

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

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Making A Difference

We May Act Sophisticated And Worldly But I Believe We Feel Safest When We Go Inside Ourselves And Find Home, A Place Where We Belong And Maybe The Only Place We Really Do.

As Soon As Healing Takes Place, Go Out And Heal Somebody Else.

You May Encounter Many Defeats, But You Must Not Be Defeated. Please Remember That Your Difficulties Do Not Define You. They Simply Strengthen Your Ability To Overcome.

You Don't Want Modesty, You Want Humility. Humility Comes From Inside Out. It Says Someone Was Here Before Me And I'm Here Because I've Been Paid For. I Have Something To Do And I Will Do That Because I'm Paying For Someone Else Who Has Yet To Come.

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.

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.

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.

Each Time A Dancer Moves Devoutly Or A Composer Faithfully Searches The Silence For The Veiled Melodies, Eternity Is Engaged.

If It Is True That A Chain Is Only As Strong As Its Weakest Link, Isn't It Also True A Society Is Only As Healthy As Its Sickest Citizen And Only As Wealthy As Its Most Deprived?

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.

Continue To Plant A Kiss Of Concern On The Cheek Of The Sick And The Aged And Infirm And Count That Actions As Natural And To Be Expected.

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.

Sunday, If I'm Lucky, I'll Go To Church Or Listen To Some Good Spiritual Advice On The Television Or On The Radio. I Take Three Or Four Baths To Try To Cleanse Myself, So I'm Fresh For Monday.

Each Of Us Has The Right And The Responsibility To Assess The Roads Which Lie Ahead, And Those Over Which We Have Traveled, And If The Future Road Looms Ominous Or Unpromising, And The Roads Back Uninviting, Then We Need To Gather Our Resolve And, Carrying Only The Necessary Baggage, Step Off That Road Into Another Direction. If The New Choice Is Also Unpalatable, Without Embarrassment, We Must Be Ready To Change That As Well.

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.

You Are The Sum Total Of Everything You've Seen, Heard, Eaten, Smelled, Been Told, Forgot- It's All Right There.

The Caged Bird Sings With A Fearful Trill, Of Things Unknown, But Longed For Still, And His Tune Is Heard On The Distant Hill, For The Caged Bird Sings Of Freedom.

My Mother Said I Must Always Be Intolerant Of Ignorance But Understanding Of Illiteracy. That Some People, Unable To Go To School, Were More Educated And More Intelligent Than College Professors.

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

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

Without Courage You Cannot Practice Any Of The Other Virtues.

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.

Each One Of Us Has Lived Through Some Devastation, Some Loneliness, Some Weather Superstorm Or Spiritual Superstorm, When We Look At Each Other We Must Say, I Understand. I Understand How You Feel Because I Have Been There Myself. We Must Support Each Other And Empathize With Each Other Because Each Of Us Is More Alike Than We Are Unalike.

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. Few, If Any, Survive Their Teens. Most Surrender To The Vague But Murderous Pressure Of Adult Conformity. It Becomes Easier To Die And Avoid Conflict Than To Maintain A Constant Battle With The Superior Forces Of Maturity.

The Sadness Of The Women's Movement Is That They Don't Allow The Necessity Of Love. See, I Don't Personally Trust Any Revolution Where Love Is Not Allowed.

I Agree With Balzac And 19th-century Writers, Black And White, Who Say, 'i Write For Money.' Yes, I Think Everybody Should Be Paid Handsomely; I Insist On It, And I Pay People Who Work For Me, Or With Me, Handsomely.

Black And White

I Keep On Dying, Because I Love To Live

It's True. I Can Do Anything And Do It Well Because God Loves Me. It Still Humbles Me.

If You Want To Liberate Someone, Love Them.not Be In Love With Them - That's Dangerous. If You're In Love With Your Children, You're In Their Lives All The Time. Leave Them Alone! Let Them Grow And Make Some Mistakes. Tell Them, "you Can Come Home. My Arms Are Here - And My Mouth Is Too." When You Really Love Them, You Don't Want To Possess Them. You Don't Say, "i Love You And I Want You Here With Me."

If I'm Going To A New Country, I Try To Learn Something About The Language And The Culture, So I Don't Just Go Bumbling Over Things.

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.

I've Had Rainbows In My Clouds.

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

In All The Institutions I Try To Be Present And Accountable For All I Do And Leave Undone. I Know That Eventually I Shall Have To Be Present And Accountable N The Presence Of God. I Do Not Wish To Be Found Wanting.

There Is A Kind Of Strength That Is Almost Frightening In Black Women. It's As If A Steel Rod Runs Right Through The Head Down To The Feet.

Look For The Beauty In Things.

I'm Here, And I Do My Best To Be Completely Centered At The Place I'm At, Then I Go Forward To The Next Place.

I've Tried To Be Totally Present, So That When I'm Finished With A Piece Of Work, I'm Finished. ... The Work, Once Completed, Does Not Need Me. The Work I'm Working On Needs My Total Concentration. The One That's Finished Doesn't Belong To Me Anymore. It Belongs To Itself.

I Am A Woman Phenomenally, Phenomenal Woman That Is Your Grandmother, That Is Your Mother, That Is Your Sister, That Is You And That Is Me.

Phenomenal Woman

You May Encounter Many Defeats, But You Must Not Be Defeated. In Fact, It May Be Necessary To Encounter The Defeats, So You Can Know Who You Are, What You Can Rise From, How You Can Still Come Out Of It.

The Trouble For The Thief Is Not How To Steal The Chief’s Bugle, But Where To Blow It.

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.

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

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

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I Don't Know How Much Longer I'll Be Around. I'll Probably Be Writing When The Lord Says, 'maya, Maya Angelou, It's Time.'

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

In The Fifties, You Have Your Beauty As A Treat. I Thought That Until I Hit The Sixties.in Your Sixties, Life Decides To Reward You With Certain Kinds Of Profound Appreciation, So That People Name Their Children And Schools And Libraries After You! And You Still Have Your Sexuality And Your Sensuality. If You Want Your Sexuality, You Still Have It.

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.

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

I've Learned That Regardless Of Your Relationship With Your Parents, You'll Miss Them When They're Gone From Your Life.

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

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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.

There Is A Very Fine Line Between Loving Life And Being Greedy For It.

If On Judgement Day I Were Summoned By St. Peter To Give Testimony To The Used-to-be Sheriff's Act Of Kindness, I Would Be Unable To Say Anything In His Behalf. His Confidence That My Uncle And Every Other Black Man Who Heard Of The Klan's Coming Ride Would Scurry Under Their Houses To Hide In Chicken Droppings Was Too Humiliating To Hear. Without Waiting For Momma's Thanks, He Rode Out Of The Yard, Sure That Things Were As They Should Be And That He Was A Gentle Squire, Saving Those Deserving Serfs From The Laws Of The Land, Which He Condoned.

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.

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.

I Would Like To Be Known As An Intelligent Woman, A Courageous Woman, A Loving Woman, A Woman Who Teaches By Being.

There Is No Place Where God Is Not.

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

I Read The Bible To Myself; I'll Take Any Translation, Any Edition, And Read It Aloud, Just To Hear The Language, Hear The Rhythm, And Remind Myself How Beautiful English Is.

I've Had People Explain To Me What One Of My Poems Meant, And I've Been Surprised That It Means That To Them. If A Person Can Use A Poem Of Mine To Interpret Her Life Or His Life, Good. I Can't Control That. Nor Would I Want To.

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.

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

The White American Man Makes The White American Woman Maybe Not Superfluous But Just A Little Kind Of Decoration. Not Really Important To Turning Around The Wheels Of The State. Well The Black American Woman Has Never Been Able To Feel That Way. No Black American Man At Any Time In Our History In The United States Has Been Able To Feel That He Didn't Need That Black Woman Right Against Him, Shoulder To Shoulder-in That Cotton Field, On The Auction Block, In The Ghetto, Wherever.

I Couldn't Tell Fact From Fiction, Or If The Dream Was True My Only Sure Prediction In This World Was You. I'd Touch Your Features Inchly. Beard Love And Dared The Cost, The Sented Spiel Reeled Me Unreal And I Found My Senses Lost.

The Country Didn't Get That Way In A Week; We've Had Years And Years Of Getting Behind In Our Economy. So President [barack] Obama Stepped Into A Hellhole And People Wanted Him To Change It As Soon As He Came In. But He's Got His Adversaries To Deal With In The House And Senate, So It's Not Easy.

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

If You Will Have A Person Enslaved, The First Thing You Must Do Is Convince Yourself That The Person Is Subhuman. The Second Thing You Have To Do Is Convince Your Allies So You'll Have Some Help, And The Third And Probably Unkindest Cut Of All Is To Convince That Person That He Or She Is Subhuman And Deserves It.

I Believe That One Can Never Leave Home. I Believe That One Carries The Shadows, The Dreams, The Fears And The Dragons Of Home Under One's Skin, At The Extreme Corners Of One's Eyes And Possibly In The Gristle Of The Earlobe.

You May Not Remember What A Person Said To You, You May Not Remember What A Person Did To You, But You Will Never Forget How A Person Made You Feel!

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

If I'm Going To A New Country, I Try To Learn Something About The Language And The Culture, So I Don't Just Go Bumbling Over Things.

We Allow Our Ignorance To Prevail Upon Us And Make Us Think We Can Survive Alone, Alone In Patches, Alone In Groups, Alone In Races, Even Alone In Genders.

Being A Woman Is Hard Work.

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

The Truth Is Very Important. No Matter How Negative It Is, It Is Imperative That You Learn The Truth, Not Necessarily The Facts. I Mean, That, That Can Come, But Facts Can Stand In Front Of The Truth And Almost Obscure The Truth. It Is Imperative That Students Learn The Truth Of Our History.

We Are Not Just Flesh And Blood. And Our Hungers Are Not Going To Be Set Aside As Just Flesh And Blood.

Flesh And Blood

Our Stories Come From Our Lives And From The Playwright's Pen, The Mind Of The Actor, The Roles We Create, The Artistry Of Life Itself And The Quest For Peace.

In Spite Of Everything That Was Done To Me And My Race, In Spite Of The Adversity And The Bitter Moments, Again We Rise.

Self-pity In Its Early Stage Is As Snug As A Feather Mattress. Only When It Hardens Does It Become Uncomfortable.

Pretty Women Wonder Where My Secret Lies, Im Not Cute Or Built To Fit A Fashion Models Size.

I Would Ask Every Man And Every Woman Who's Had The Blessing Of Having Children, 'would You Deny Your Son Or Your Daughter The Ecstasy Of Finding Someone To Love?' To Love Someone Takes A Lot Of Courage. So How Much More Is One Challenged When The Love Is Of The Same Sex And The Laws Say, 'i Forbid You From Loving This Person'?

Ask For What You Want And Be Prepared To Get It!

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.'

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.

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

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.

A Woman In Harmony With Her Spirit Is Like A River Flowing. She Goes Where She Will Without Pretense And Arrives At Her Destination Prepared To Be Herself And Only Herself

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

Look What You've Already Come Through! Don't Deny It. Say I'm Stronger Than I Thought I Was

I'm A Positive Thinker And Actor. I Look At A Glass; A Negative Person Sees The Glass And Says: Too Bad It's Half Empty... I Look At The Same Glass And Say: Hallelujah!! It's Half Full!!!

Some Critics Will Write 'maya Angelou Is A Natural Writer' - Which Is Right After Being A Natural Heart Surgeon.

Therefore We Pledge To Bind Ourselves To One Another, To Embrace Our Lowliest, To Keep Company With Our Loneliest, To Educate Our Illiterate, To Feed Our Starving, To Clothe Our Ragged, To Do All Good Things, Knowing That We Are More Than Keepers Of Our Brothers And Sisters. We Are Our Brothers And Sisters

There Are Great Parents Of Small Children - They Keep Their Little Hair In Bows - But Those Parents Are Not Always Good Parents Of Young Adults. As Soon As Their Children Get Up To Some Size, It's "shut Up, Sit Down, You Talk Too Much, Keep Your Distance, I'll Send You To Europe!" My Mom Was A Terrible Parent Of Small Children But A Great Parent Of Young Adults. She'd Talk To Me As If I Had Some Sense.

We Are Not Our Brother’s Keeper We Are Our Brother And We Are Our Sister. We Must Look Past Complexion And See Community.

Words Are Things. You Must Be Careful, Careful About Calling People Out Of Their Names, Using Racial Pejoratives And Sexual Pejoratives And All That Ignorance. Don’t Do That. Some Day We’ll Be Able To Measure The Power Of Words. I Think They Are Things. They Get On The Walls. They Get In Your Wallpaper. They Get In Your Rugs, In Your Upholstery, And Your Clothes, And Finally In To You.

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

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

I Would Be A Liar, A Hypocrite, Or A Fool - And I'm Not Any Of Those - To Say That I Don't Write For The Reader. I Do. But For The Reader Who Hears, Who Really Will Work At It, Going Behind What I Seem To Say. So I Write For Myself And That Reader Who Will Pay The Dues.

I Think We All Have Empathy. We May Not Have Enough Courage To Display It.

Strictly Speaking, One Cannot Legislate Love, But What One Can Do Is Legislate Fairness And Justice. If Legislation Does Not Prohibit Our Living Side By Side, Sooner Or Later Your Child Will Fall On The Pavement And I'll Be The One To Pick Her Up. Or One Of My Children Will Not Be Able To Get Into The House And You'll Have To Say, "stop Here Until Your Mom Comes Here." Legislation Affords Us The Chance To See If We Might Love Each Other.

Most People Don't Grow Up. Most People Age. They Find Parking Spaces, Honor Their Credit Cards, Get Married, Have Children, And Call That Maturity. What That Is, Is Aging.

This Conference ? Of, For And About Women ? Is, In Itself, A Rainbow In The Clouds. When Numerous Women Come Together And Show That They Care, Not Only For Themselves But Also For Each Other, That Is The Occasion When A Rainbow Is Shining Down On Somebody Else.

In Diversity There Is Beauty And There Is Strength.

The First Thing I Do In The Morning When I Awaken Is Say, 'thank You, Lord!' I'm Grateful To Be Alive, And I'm Going To Try To Tell The Truth As Well As I Know And Tell It As Eloquently As I Can So That People Can Hear It.

Live As Though Life Was Created For You.

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.'

I'm Very Blessed That I Have A Healthy Temper. I Can Become Quite Angry And Burning In Anger, But I Have Never Been Bitter. Bitterness Is A Corrosive, Terrible Acid. It Just Eats You And Makes You Sick.

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

I've Learned That People Will Forget What You Said, People Will Forget What You Did, But People Will Never Forget How You Made Them Feel.

Each Of Us Has The Right And The Responsibility To Assess The Roads Which Lie Ahead, And Those Over Which We Have Traveled, And If The Future Road Looms Ominous Or Unpromising, And The Roads Back Uninviting, Then We Need To Gather Our Resolve And, Carrying Only The Necessary Baggage, Step Off That Road Into Another Direction. If The New Choice Is Also Unpalatable, Without Embarrassment, We Must Be Ready To Change That As Well.

Alone, All Alone Nobody, But Nobody Can Make It Out Here Alone.

It's Amazing. I Can Do Anything. And Do It Well. Any Good Thing, I Can Do It. That's Why I Am Who I Am, Yes, Because God Loves Me And I'm Amazed At It. I'm Grateful For It.

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.

Be Wary When A Naked Person Offers You His Shirt

I Do Not Need To Know All Things. I Remind Myself That It Is Sufficient That I Know What I Know And Know That Without Believing That I Will Always Know What I Know Or That What I Know Will Always Be True.

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

The Caged Bird Sings With A Fearful Trill, Of Things Unknown, But Longed For Still, And His Tune Is Heard On The Distant Hill, For The Caged Bird Sings Of Freedom.

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

Women Should Be Tough, Tender, Laugh As Much As Possible, And Live Long Lives. The Struggle For Equality Continues Unabated, And The Woman Warrior Who Is Armed With Wit And Courage Will Be Among The First To Celebrate Victory.

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

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.

Nathaniel Hawthorne Once Said That Easy Reading Is Damn Hard Writing.

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.'

Without Defeats, How Do You Really Know Who The Hell You Are? If You Never Had To Stand Up To Something - To Get Up, To Be Knocked Down, And To Get Up Again - Life Can Walk Over You Wearing Football Cleats. But Each Time You Do Get Up, You're Bigger, Taller, Finer, More Beautiful, More Kind, More Understanding, More Loving. Each Time You Get Up, You're More Inclusive. More People Can Stand Under Your Umbrella.

My Heart Is So Heavy When I See The Reality Of The Indian Reservation And As An American, I Know I Am, Too, Responsible.

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

Remember, People Will Judge You By Your Actions Not Your Intentions. You May Have A Heart Of Gold But So Does A Hard-boiled Egg.

You May Not Control All The Events That Happen To You, But You Can Decide Not To Be Reduced By Them.

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

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

My Mother Said I Must Always Be Intolerant Of Ignorance But Understanding Of Illiteracy. That Some People, Unable To Go To School, Were More Educated And More Intelligent Than College Professors.

I'm Considered Wise, And Sometimes I See Myself As Knowing. Most Of The Time, I See Myself As Wanting To Know. And I See Myself As A Very Interested Person. I've Never Been Bored In My Life.

I Go To A Hotel And Try To Get There By 5:30 In The Morning. I Keep A Dictionary, A Thesaurus, A Bible, A Deck Of Playing Cards, A Bottle Of Sherry, And Stacks Of Yellow Sticky Pads. I Shut Myself In For Six, Seven Hours. I Have An Arrangement With The Hotel That No One May Go In My Room. After Three Or Four Months, They Might Slip Notes Under My Door Like, "dear Ms. Angelou, Please Let Us Change The Linens. We Think They Might Be Molding." It's Probably True. I Let Them In If They Promise Not To Touch Anything Other Then The Bed.

Continue To Be Bold, Courageous. Try To Choose The Wisest Thing And Once You've Chosen The Wisest Thing Go Out And Try To Achieve It. Be It.

You Can Never Be Great At Anything Unless You Love It.

Blacks Concede That Hurrawing, Jibing, Jiving, Signifying, Disrespecting, Cursing, Even Outright Insults Might Be Acceptable Under Particular Conditions, But Aspersions Cast Against One's Family Call For Immediate Attack.

My Life Has Been Long, And Believing That Life Loves The Liver Of It, I Have Dared To Try Many Things, Sometimes Trembling, But Daring Still.

Out Of The Huts Of History's Shame I Rise.

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.

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

I Have A Son, Who Is My Heart. A Wonderful Young Man, Daring And Loving And Strong And Kind.

Stormy Or Sunny Days, Glorious Or Lonely Nights, I Maintain An Attitude Of Gratitude.

I Know, That Since Life Is Our Most Precious Gift, And As Far As We Can Be Absolutely Certain, It's Given To Us To Live But Once, Let Us So Live We Will Not Regret Years Of Useless Virtue, And Inertia, And Timidity, And Ignorance, And In Our Last Moments We Can Say: 'all My Life, All My Conscious Energies, Have Been Dedicated To The Most Noble Cause In The World, The Liberation Of The Human Mind And Spirit - Beginning With My Own'.

How Important It Is For Us To Recognize And Celebrate Our Heroes And She-roes!

The Need For Change Bulldozed A Road Down The Center Of My Mind.

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

I Want All My Senses Engaged. Let Me Absorb The World's Variety And Uniqueness.

Martin Luther King Was A Human Being With A Brilliant Mind, A Powerful Heart, And Insight, And Courage And Also With A Sense Of Humor. So He Was Accessible.

Love Recognizes No Barriers.

At Our Best, We're All Teachers

Never, Never Let A Person Know You're Frightened. And A Group Of Them ... Absolutely Never. Fear Brings Out The Worst In Everybody.

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

I Do Not Believe That The Accident Of Birth Makes People Sisters And Brothers. It Makes Them Siblings. Gives Them Mutuality Of Parentage. Sisterhood And Brotherhood Are Conditions People Have To Work At. It's A Serious Matter. You Compromise, You Give, You Take, You Stand Firm, And You're Relentless...and It Is An Investment. Sisterhood Means If You Happen To Be In Burma And I Happen To Be In San Diego And I'm Married To Someone Who Is Very Jealous And You're Married To Somebody Who Is Very Possessive, If You Call Me In The Middle Of The Night, I Have To Come.

Education Helps One Case Cease Being Intimidated By Strange Situations.

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.

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.

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.

Y’all Dropped The Ball And You Should Be Shamed.

Even Here In America, We Felt The Cool, Refreshing Breeze Of Freedom When Nelson Mandela Took The Seat Of Presidency In His Country Where Formerly He Was Not Even Allowed To Vote. We Were Enlarged By Tears Of Pride As We Saw Nelson Mandela's Former Prison Guards Invited, Courteously, By Him To Watch From The Front Rows His Inauguration.

There Is An Intimate Laughter To Be Found Only Among Friends

Inspirational Friendship

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.

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

Whenever I'm Around Some Who Is Modest, I Think, 'run Like Hell And All Of Fire.' You Don't Want Modesty, You Want Humility.

My Mother Raised Me, And Then Freed Me.

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.

I Speak To The Black Experience, But I Am Always Talking About The Human Condition.

I Thank God That I've Lived Long Enough To See What I Have Seen, And I Pray That People Will Continue To Do Better. We Are Doing Better, It May Not Seem So, But There Was A Time When People Were Lynched In The Middle Of The Street And It Was Not Against The Law. We Are Doing Better, But We Have So Much More To Do.

When I Am 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'm Trying For That. But I'm Also Trying For The Language. I'm Trying To See How It Can Really Sound.

I'm Very Blessed That I Have A Healthy Temper. I Can Become Quite Angry And Burning In Anger, But I Have Never Been Bitter. Bitterness Is A Corrosive, Terrible Acid. It Just Eats You And Makes You Sick.

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.

If You Are Going Down A Road And Don't Like What's In Front Of You, And Look Behind You And Don't Like What You See, Get Off The Road. Create A New Path!

Positive Attitude

I Love A Statement By The Apostle Paul, In The Book Of Philippians In The Bible. I Think The Corinthians Had Been Writing To Paul, Telling Him That Old Men Were Chasing Young Women, Nobody Was Tithing - And All That Must Have Run Paul Crazy. He Wrote Back And Said, "if There Be Anything Of Good Report, Speak Of These Things." That's One Of My Principles.it's Another Discipline That I Encourage Myself To Employ - To, As Much As Possible, Say The Courteous Thing, And Then Be 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.

We Need To Remember That We Are All Created Creative And Can Invent New Scenarios As Frequently As They Are Needed.

We Must Infuse Our Lives With Art. Our National Leaders Must Be Informed That We Want Them To Use Our Taxes To Support Street Theatre In Order To Oppose Street Gangs. We Should Have A Well-supported Regional Theatre In Order To Oppose Regionalism And.

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

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.

Each One Of Us Has Lived Through Some Devastation, Some Loneliness, Some Weather Superstorm Or Spiritual Superstorm, When We Look At Each Other We Must Say, I Understand. I Understand How You Feel Because I Have Been There Myself. We Must Support Each Other And Empathize With Each Other Because Each Of Us Is More Alike Than We Are Unalike.

When I Look Back, I Am So Impressed Again With The Life-giving Power Of Literature. If I Were A Young Person Today, Trying To Gain A Sense Of Myself In The World, I Would Do That Again By Reading, Just As I Did When I Was Young.

I Dreamt We Walked Together Along The Shore. We Made Satisfying Small Talk And Laughed. This Morning I Found Sand In My Shoe And A Seashell In My Pocket. Was I Only Dreaming?

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.

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.

There Is A World Of Difference Between Facts And The Truth. You Can Have So Many Facts That You Don't Deal With The Truth. You Never Get To The Truth. You Have The Places Where, The People Who, The Times When, The Reasons Why, The Methods How - Blah Blah. And Never Get To The Human Truth. The Human Truth Is As Elusive As The Air. And As Important As The Air.

Oh, Black Known And Unknown Poets, How Often Have Your Auctioned Pains Sustained Us? Who Will Compute The Lonely Nights Made Less Lonely By Your Songs, Or By The Empty Pots Made Less Tragic By Your Tales? If We Were A People Much Given To Revealing Secrets, We Might Raise Monuments And Sacrifice To The Memories Of Our Poets, But Slavery Cured Us Of That Weakness.

I Believe That Quality Level Is Determined Primarily By The Actual Design Of The Product Itself, Not By Quality Control In The Production Process.

I Know That You That You May Encounter Many Defeats, But You Must Not Be Defeated. If You Accept That You Have Been Defeated, You Give Power To The Force That Is Trying To Defeat You.

We Really Are 15 Countries, And It's Remarkable That Each Of Us Thinks We Represent The Real America. The Midwesterner In Kansas, The Black American In Durham - Both Are Certain They Are The Real American.

The Black Kids, The Poor White Kids, Spanish-speaking Kids, And Asian Kids In The Us - In The Face Of Everything To The Contrary, They Still Bop And Bump, Shout And Go To School Somehow. Their Optimism Gives Me Hope.

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Colonel Sanders

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