Background Image

...

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?"

-Maya Angelou

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

When My Grandmother Died,

Maya Angelou

...

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?"

Views: 6773

Topic

Impossible Things

More From Maya Angelou

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 So Many Ways, Segregation Shaped Me, And Education Liberated Me.

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.

I Think Music Is One Of The Hero/sheroes Of The African-american Existence.

African American

As A Nurse, We Have The Opportunity To Heal The Heart, Mind, Soul And Body Of Our Patients, Their Families And Ourselves. They May Not Remember Your Name But They Will Never Forget The Way You Made Them Feel.

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.

The Desire To Reach For The Stars Is Ambitious. The Desire To Reach Hearts Is Wise.

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

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.

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.

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.

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 Person Deserves A Day Away In Which No Problems Are Confronted, No Solutions Searched For.

Bringing The Gifts That My Ancestors Gave, I Am The Dream And The Hope Of The Slave. I Rise. I Rise. I Rise.

I'm Sorry To Say That When Some People Get To Age 50, They Say, "well, That's The End, I'll Never Have To Do Sex Again." They Lay Down First And Get Up Last! But In Your Sixties, Everything Is Sweeter. You Have More Time.

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.

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

Oh, The Holiness Of Being The Injured Party.

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 Have Forgiven Myself; I'll Make A Change. Once That Forgiveness Has Taken Place You Can Console Yourself With The Knowledge That A Diamond Is The Result Of Extreme Pressure. Less Pressure Is Crystal, Less Than That Is Coal, Less Than That Is Fossilized Leaves Or Plain Dirt. Pressure Can Change You Into Something Quite Precious, Quite Wonderful, Quote Beautiful And Extremely Hard.

Would You Deny Your Son Or Your Daughter The Ecstasy Of Finding Someone To Love?

Finding Someone

There's Racism And Sexism And Ageism And All Sorts Of Idiocies. But Bad News Is Not News. We've Had Bad News As A Species For A Long Time. We've Had Slavery And Human Sacrifice And The Holocaust And Brutalities Of Such Measure.

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

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 Don't Know If I Continue, Even Today, Always Liking Myself. But What I Learned To Do Many Years Ago Was To Forgive Myself. It Is Very Important For Every Human Being To Forgive Herself Or Himself Because If You Live, You Will Make Mistakes - It Is Inevitable. But Once You Do And You See The Mistake, Then You Forgive Yourself And Say, 'well, If I'd Known Better I'd Have Done Better,' That's All.

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."

Won't It Be Wonderful When Black History And Native American History And Jewish History And All Of U.s. History Is Taught From One Book. Just U.s. History.

Native American

When Someone Shows You Who They Are, Believe Them The First Time.

We Spend Precious Hours Fearing The Inevitable. It Would Be Wise To Use That Time Adoring Our Families, Cherishing Our Friends And Living Our Lives.

All Of Childhood's Unanswered Questions Must Finally Be Passed Back To The Town And Answered There. Heroes And Bogey Men, Values And Dislikes, Are First Encountered And Labeled In That Early Environment. In Later Years They Change Faces, Places And Maybe Races, Tactics, Intensities And Goals, But Beneath Those Penetrable Masks They Wear Forever The Stocking-capped Faces Of Childhood.

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

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.

Determine To Live Life With Flair And Laughter.

A Story Went The Rounds About A San Franciscan White Matron Who Refused To Sit Beside A Negro Civilian On The Streetcar, Even After He Made Room For Her On The Seat. Her Explanation Was That She Would Not Sit Beside A Draft Dodger Who Was A Negro As Well. She Added That The Least He Could Do Was Fight For His Country The Way Her Son Was Fighting On Iwo Jima. The Story Said That The Man Pulled His Body Away From The Window To Show An Armless Sleeve. He Said Quietly And With Great Dignity, "then Ask Your Son To Look Around For My Arm, Which I Left Over There.

When It Looks Like The Sun Isn't Going To Shine Any More, God Puts A Rainbow In The Clouds. Each One Of Us Has The Possibility, The Responsibility, The Probability To Be The Rainbow In The Clouds.

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

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.

The Autobiographer Looks At Life Through The Lens Of His Or Her Own Life And Really Uses Herself Or Himself As The Jumping-off Place To Examine The Social Mores And The Economic And Political Climates. In A Way, The Autobiography Becomes History As Well As The Story Of One Person, For It Becomes The Story Of A Family Or The Story Of The State Or Nation.

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.

Information Helps You To See That You're Not Alone. That There's Somebody In Mississippi And Somebody In Tokyo Who Have Wept, Who've All Longed And Lost, Who've All Been Happy. So The Library Helps You To See, Not Only That You Are Not Alone, But That You're Not Really Any Different From Everyone Else.

If You're Going To Live, Leave A Legacy. Make A Mark On The World That Can't Be Erased.

I'm Young As Morning And Fresh As Dew. Everybody Loves Me And So Do You.

Believe In Yourself

You Can Only Accomplish What I Really Love. Do Not Take The Money As A Goal. Instead, Pursue The Things You Passionate About, And Do Good To Others Can Not Take My Eyes Off You

I'm Happy To Be A Writer - Of Prose, Poetry, Every Kind Of Writing. Every Person In The World Who Isn't A Recluse, Hermit Or Mute Uses Words. I Know Of No Other Art Form That We Always Use.

A Woman In Harmony With Her Spirit Is Like A River Flowing.

The Area Where We Are The Greatest Is The Area In Which We Inspire, Encourage And Connect With Another Human Being.

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.

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.

When Someone Shows You Who They Are, Believe Them The First Time.

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

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

If A Person - Any Human Being - Is Told Often Enough, "you Are Nothing. You Are Nothing. You Account For Nothing. You Count For Nothing. You Are Less Than A Human Being. I Have No Visibility Of You", The Person Finally Begins To Believe It.

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

If You're Going To Live, Leave A Legacy. Make A Mark On The World That Can't Be Erased.

Precious Jewel, You Glow, You Shine, Reflecting All The Good Things In The World. Just Look At Yourself.

Precious Jewels

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

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 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.

Reduce Your Humanity Through What Jules Feiffer Called Little Murders. The Minute I Hear Someone Trying To Demean Me, I Know That That Person Means To Have My Life. And I Will Not Give It To Them. When A Person Commits These Little Murders, And Then You Catch Him Or Her At It, He Or She Might Say, "oh, I Didn't Mean It." But Make No Mistake: It Is An Assassination Attempt.

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.

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

Fighting For One's Freedom, Struggling Towards Being Free, Is Like Struggling To Be A Poet Or A Good Christian Or A Good Jew Or A Good Muslim Or Good Zen Buddhist. You Work All Day Long And Achieve Some Kind Of Level Of Success By Nightfall, Go To Sleep And Wake Up The Next Morning With The Job Still To Be Done. So You Start All Over Again.

Always In The Black Spirituals There's That Promise That Things Are Going To Be Better, By And By.

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

To Make A Difference Is Not A Matter Of Accident...people Choose To Make A Difference.

Making A Difference

History, Despite Its Wrenching Pain, Cannot Be Unlived, But If Faced With Courage, Need Not Be Lived Again.

No One Has Ever Become Poor From Giving.

Thank You, Always Say Thank You; It's The Greatest Gift You Can Give Someone; Because Thank You Is What You Say To God.

Saying Thank You

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

Yet It Is Only Love Which Sets Us Free.

I Wrote Some Of The Worst Poetry West From The Mississippi River, But I Wrote. And I Finally Sometimes Got It Right.

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.

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.

If You're Serious, You Really Understand That It's Important That You Laugh As Much As Possible And Admit That You're The Funniest Person You Ever Met. You Have To Laugh. Admit That You're Funny. Otherwise, You Die In Solemnity.

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.'

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

While The Rest Of The World Has Been Improving Technology, Ghana Has Been Improving The Quality Of Man's Humanity To Man.

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.

No Human Being Can Be More Human Than Another Human Being. I Liberate You From My Ignorance.

African American

The Music Was My Friend, My Lover, My Family.

Sometimes All You Need In Love Is To Make Each Other Happy, To Make Each Other Laugh. So Long As You Can Still Do That Ten Years Down The Line Then I Think You're Gold. Never Let The Laughter Slip From Your Relationship.

If You Have A Song To Sing, Who Are You Not To Open Your Mouth And Sing To The World?

Pretty Women Wonder Where My Secret Lies.

Life Is Pure Adventure, And The Sooner We Realize That, The Quicker We Will Be Able To Treat Life As Art.

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.

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

The Problem I Have With Haters Is That They See My Glory, But They Don't Know My Story.

Women Been Gittin' Pregnant Ever Since Eve Ate That Apple.

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

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.

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.

Listen To Some Good Poetry. You See? It Keeps Us From Thinking We Are Only What Our Blatant Appetites Describe Us As.

I Do Not Trust People Who Don't Love Themselves And Yet Tell Me, 'i Love You.' There Is An African Saying Which Is: Be Careful When A Naked Person Offers You A Shirt.

I Think Clinton, After Getting Into Office And Into Washington, Was Shocked At Being Bludgeoned. So He Spent Time Trying To Be All Things To All People - One Way Guaranteed Not To Be Successful Or Respected In A Lion's Den. You Can't Just Play Around With All Those Big Cats - You've Got To Take Somebody On.

That Knowledge Humbles Me, Melts My Bones, Closes My Ears, And Makes My Teeth Rock Loosely In Their Gums. And It Also Liberates Me. I Am A Big Bird Winging Over High Mountains, Down Into Serene Valleys. I Am Ripples Of Waves On Silver Seas. I'm A Spring Leaf Trembling In Anticipation.

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

The Ache For Home Lives In All Of Us, The Safe Place Where We Can Go As We Are And Not Be Questioned.

Whining Is Not Only Graceless, But It Can Be Dangerous. It Can Alert A Brute That A Victim Is In The Neighborhood.

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

Try To Be All You Can Be To Be The Best Human Being You Can Be. Try To Be That In Your Church, In Your Temple. Try To Be That In Your Classroom. Do It Because It Is Right To Do.

Making A Decision To Write Was A Lot Like Deciding To Jump Into A Frozen Lake.

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.

Whining Is Not Only Graceless, But It Can Be Dangerous. It Can Alert A Brute That A Victim Is In The Neighborhood.

Black Women Have Not Historically Stood In The Pulpit, But That Doesn't Undermine The Fact That They Built The Churches And Maintain The Pulpits.

Growing Up At My Grandmother's Table, She Always Had Rice. She Might Do Something As Exotic As Potatoes Or Spaghetti, But There Was Still Always Rice, Just In Case You Needed A Little Rice Fix.

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.

Creativity Or Talent, Like Electricity, Is Something I Don't Understand But Something I'm Able To Harness And Use.

People Will Never Forget How You Made Them Feel.

I Became The Kind Of Parent My Mother Was To Me.

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.

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.

One Of The Saddest Things In The World Is To See A Cynical Young Person.

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.

If You Don't Like Something, Change It. If You Can't Change It, Change Your Attitude.

Shakespeare Must Be A Black Girl.

Stepping Onto A Brand-new Path Is Difficult, But Not More Difficult Than Remaining In A Situation, Which Is Not Nurturing To The Whole Woman.

You May Not Get What You Paid For, But You Will Pay For What You Get.

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

I Have Found That Among Its Other Benefits, Giving Liberates The Soul Of The Giver.

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

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.

The Plague Of Racism Is Insidious, Entering Into Our Minds As Smoothly And Quietly And Invisibly As Floating Airborne Microbes Enter Into Our Bodies To Find Lifelong Purchase In Our Bloodstreams.

We Will Sometimes Have Defeats In Life But You Can Have Defeats Without Being Defeated, You Could Fail Without Being A Failure. When You See Failure And Defeats As Merely Part Of The Process To Get To When.

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

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.

I Admire People Who Dare To Take The Language, English, And Understand It And Understand The Melody.

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

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

My Mother Said I Must Always Be Intolerant Of Ignorance But Understanding Of Illiteracy.

Without Courage You Cannot Practice Any Of The Other Virtues.

Make Every Effort To Change Things You Do Not Like. If You Cannot Make A Change, Change The Way You Have Been Thinking. You Might Find A New Solution.

Food Served Is Always More Than Just Food Served. That Is To Say, It Is More Than Just Fuel For The Body. Depending Upon Who Has Prepared The Food And Who Has Served It And With What Spirit, It Can Uplift The - And Around The World, In Every Culture, Food Is Used To Flirt, To Be Coy, A Raise In The Employment Or To Search For Employment. It Can Bring Warring Factions Together.

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.

Troubles Are A Blessing That Force You To Change, To Believe.

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 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.'

Step Off The Road. Build Yourself A Brand New Path.

I Note The Obvious Differences Between Each Sort And Type, But We Are More Alike, My Friends, Than We Are Unalike.

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.

You Can Only Become Truly Accomplished At Something You Love. Don’t Make Money Your Goal. Instead Pursue The Things You Love Doing And Then Do Them So Well That People Can’t Take Their Eyes Off Of You.

I Thought If I Could Face The Worst Danger Voluntarily, And Triumph, I Would Forever Have Power Over It.

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.

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

Open Your Eyes To The Beauty Around You, Open Your Mind To The Wonders Of Life, Open Your Heart To Those Who Love You, And Always Be True To Yourself.

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.

All Great Achievements Require Time.

We Need Much Less Than We Think We Need.

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

We Are Here To Love Each Other. That Is Why You Are Alive. That Is What Life Is For.

Love Each Other

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

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 Could Fall In Love With A Sumo Wrestler If He Told Stories And Made Me Laugh. Obviously, It Would Be Easier If Someone Was African-american And Lived Next Door And Went To The Same Church. Because Then I Wouldn't Have To Translate.

Falling In Love

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!

The Question Is Not How To Survive, But How To Thrive With Passion, Compassion, Humor And Style.

It's A Wonderful Thing To Know That There Is Something To Know There Is Something Greater Than I Am, And That Is God Itself.

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'm Convinced Of This: Good Done Anywhere Is Good Done Everywhere. For A Change, Start By Speaking To People Rather Than Walking By Them Like They're Stones That Don't Matter. As Long As You're Breathing, It's Never Too Late To Do Some Good.

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.

Look Heavenward And Speak The Word Aloud. Peace. We Look At Our World And Speak The Word Aloud. Peace.

I'm A Serious Aficionada Of Country Music - Reba Mcentire, Toby Keith, Montgomery Gentry. I've Even Written Some Songs. They Haven't Done Anything Of Mine Yet. But It's Only A Matter Of Time.

If We Live Long Enough, We May Even Get Over War. I Imagine A Time When Somebody Will Mention The Word War And Everyone In The Room Will Start To Laugh. And What Do You Mean War?

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

All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes.

We Must Be Warriors In The Struggle Against Ignorance

Growing Up, I Decided, A Long Time Ago, I Wouldn't Accept Any Manmade Differences Between Human Beings, Differences Made At Somebody Else's Insistence Or Someone Else's Whim Or Convenience.

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

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.

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

Joy Is A Freedom. It Helps A Person To Find His/her Own Liberation. The Person Who Is Joyous Takes Responsibility For The Time He/she Takes Up And The Space That He/she Occupies. You Share It! Some Of You Have It ... You Share It! That Is What Joy Is! When You Continue To Give It Away You Will Still Have So Much More Of It.

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.

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

Black Women Have Not Historically Stood In The Pulpit, But That Doesn't Undermine The Fact That They Built The Churches And Maintain The Pulpits.

One Of The Saddest Things In The World Is To See A Cynical Young Person.

Courage Is The Most Important Of All The Virtues, Without It, You Can Practice No Other.

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.

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.

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.

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

Had I Known That The Heart Breaks Slowly, Dismantling Itself Into Unrecognizable Plots Of Misery... Had I Known Yet I Would Have Loved You, Your Brash And Insolent Beauty, Your Heavy Comedic Face And Knowledge Of Sweet Delights, But From A Distance I Would Have Left You Whole And Wholly For The Delectation Of Those Who Wanted More And Cared Less.

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.

Information Helps You To See That You're Not Alone. That There's Somebody In Mississippi And Somebody In Tokyo Who Have Wept, Who've All Longed And Lost, Who've All Been Happy. So The Library Helps You To See, Not Only That You Are Not Alone, But That You're Not Really Any Different From Everyone Else.

The Horizon Leans Forward, Offering You Space To Place New Steps Of Change.

Laugh As Much As You Can.

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.

All Great Artists Draw From The Same Resource: The Human Heart, Which Tells Us That We Are All More Alike Than We Are Unalike.

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

All Great Achievements Require Time.

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

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

It Is Better To Control Oneself, If One Can, And Not Hit Back. But On Certain Occasions, It Is Imperative To Defend Oneself. I Don't Think It's Fair To Ask Anybody Not To Defend Herself Or Himself.

I've Learned That You Can Tell A Lot About A Person By The Way He/she Handles These Three Things: A Rainy Day, Lost Luggage And Tangled Christmas Tree Lights. I've Learned That Making A 'living' Is Not The Same Thing As 'making A Life'. I've Learned That Whenever I Decide Something With An Open Heart, I Usually Make The Right Decision. 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 Some Things Back.

Love Is That Condition In The Human Spirit So Profound That It Allows Me To Survive, And Better Than That, To Thrive With Passion, Compassion, And Style.

One Of The Problems We Have As Writers Is We Don't Take Ourselves Seriously While Writing; Being Serious Is Setting Aside A Time And Saying If It Comes, Good; If It Doesn't Come, Good, I'll Just Sit Here.

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 As Though Life Was Created For You.

No Matter What Happens, Or How Bad It Seems Today, Life Does Go On, And It Will Be Better Tomorrow.

Some People Cannot See A Good Thing When It Is Right Here, Right Now. Others Can Sense A Good Thing Coming When It Is Days, Months, Or Miles Away.

Don't Get Older Just To Get Wiser. If You Get Older, You Will Be Wiser, I Believe That - If You Dare. But Get Older Because It's Fun!

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

We Are More Alike Than Unalike.

Trending Author

John Maynard Keynes

John Dramani Mahama

Jennifer Ellison

Aleister Crowley

Category