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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.

-Maya Angelou

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You May Encounter Many

Maya Angelou

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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.

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African American

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Black And White

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People Will Never Forget How You Made Them Feel.

I've Had Rainbows In My Clouds.

Live Life As If It Were Created Just For You.

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

If You Find It In Your Heart To Care For Somebody Else, You Will Have Succeeded.

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

When We Cast Our Bread Upon The Waters We Can Presume That Someone Downstream Whose Face We Will Never Know Will Benefit From Our Action, As We Who Are Downstream From Another Will Profit From The Grantor's Gift.

I Have No Modesty. Modesty Is A Learned Affectation. It's Like Decal Stuck Up On A Person.

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 Long For The Time When All Human History Is Taught As One History, Because It Really Is.

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

We Are Loved By Love Itself. There Is Nothing Good That We Can't Do.

I Don't Trust Anyone Who Doesn't Laugh.

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

Nothing Can Dim The Light Which Shines From Within.

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.

Every Day You Should Reach Out And Touch Someone

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

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The Idea Of Overcoming Is Always Fascinating To Me. It's Fascinating Because Few Of Us Realize How Much Energy We Have Expended Just To Be Here Today. I Don't Think We Give Ourselves Enough Credit For The Overcoming.

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

I Sustain Myself With The Love Of Family.

Your Life Is Much More Important That You Can Imagine... It Is Your First Treasure.

If We Are Honest And Fair, Then We Are Known By That. If We Are Not, Alas, We Are Known By That As Well. What We Want To Do Is Do Right, But You Have To Say It, You Have To Show It, And Not Stop.

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.

Tell The Truth And Not The Facts.

Telling The Truth

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.

But A Caged Bird Stands On The Grave Of Dreams.

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'm Really Saddened By The Attempts To Separate And Polarize. This Is A Time When We Have Hungry People, People Out Of Work, And People Out Of Spirit. This Is A Time Where We Need To Uplift, Not To Separate.

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.

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!!!

No Not Me Go Find Someone Else To Bring Down

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.

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'm A Descendant Of Someone Bought And Sold, And Brought In 1619 In What Was To Become The United States.

We Need Joy As We Need Air. We Need Love As We Need Water. We Need Each Other As We Need The Earth We Share.

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

Find A Beautiful Piece Of Art. If You Fall In Love With Van Gogh Or Matisse Or John Oliver Killens, Or If You Fall Love With The Music Of Coltrane, The Music Of Aretha Franklin, Or The Music Of Chopin - Find Some Beautiful Art And Admire It, And Realize That That Was Created By Human Beings Just Like You, No More Human, No Less.

Falling In Love

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.

We All Have That Possibility, That Potential And That Promise Of Seeing Beyond The Seeming.

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.

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

Elimination Of Illiteracy Is As Serious An Issue To Our History As The Abolition Of Slavery.

Abolition Of Slavery

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

I Want To Be Representative Of My Race-the Human Race. I Have A Chance To Show How Kind We Can Be, How Intelligent And Generous We Can Be.

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

The Difference Between Charity And Philanthropy Is The Distance Of The Soul... To Be Philanthropic Is To Give Something, To Be Charitable Is To Give One's Own Heart.

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

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.

If I Could Give You One Thought, It Would Be To Lift Someone Up. Lift A Stranger Up--lift Her Up. I Would Ask You, Mother And Father, Brother And Sister, Lovers, Mother And Daughter, Father And Son, Lift Someone. The Very Idea Of Lifting Someone Up Will Lift You, As Well.

I Believe That People Want The Scent Of Love, More Than Anything Else. And I Don't Mean Sentimentality, I Don't Mean Mush. I Mean That Idea, That Human Beings Are More Alike Than We Are Different. And That Means That I Can Love You. I Don't Mean Support You In Bad Things You Do, That I Can Understand Because You're A Human Being.

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