Maya Angelou Quotes

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“When you do nothing you feel overwhelmed and powerless. But when you get involved you feel the sense of hope and accomplishment that comes from knowing you are working to make things better.”

“Perhaps travel cannot prevent bigotry, but by demonstrating that all peoples cry, laugh, eat, worry, and die, it can introduce the idea that if we try and understand each other, we may even become friends.”

“I have found that among its other benefits, giving liberates the soul of the giver.”

“Life loves the liver of it.”

“Never whine. Whining lets a brute know that a victim is in the neighborhood.”

“Segregation shaped me; education liberated me.”

“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.”

“This is a wonderful day, I have never seen this one before.”

“Love heals. Heals and liberates. I use the word, not meaning sentimentality, but a condition so strong that it may be that which holds the stars in their heavenly positions and that which causes the blood to flow orderly in our veins.”

“If you only have one smile in you, give it to the people you love.”

“Self-pity in its early stages is as snug as a feather mattress. Only when it hardens does it become uncomfortable.”

“The woman who survives intact and happy must be at once tender and tough.”

“We need to remember that we are all created creative and can invent new scenarios as frequently as they are needed.”

“The world had taken a deep breath and was having doubts about continuing to revolve.”

“Hope for the best, be prepared for the worse. Life is shocking, but you must never appear to be shocked. For no matter how bad it is it could be worse and no matter how good it is it could be better.”

“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.”

“Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?”

“When things were very bad his soul just crawled behind his heart and curled up and went to sleep”

“I know that I'm not the easiest person to live with. The challenge I put on myself is so great that the person I live with feels himself challenged. I bring a lot to bear, and I don't know how not to.”

“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.”

“Determine to live life with flair and laughter.”

“You should never make someone a priority who views you as an option.”

“If funkytown was a trailerpark, this guy would be a double-wide.”

“I had given up some youth for knowledge, but my gain was more valuable than the loss”

“We are only as blind as we want to be.”

“Life likes to be taken by the lapel and told, "I'm with you kid. Let's go!”

“The intensity with which young people live demands that they "blank out" as often as possible.”

“He was a simple man who had no inferiority complex about his lack of education, and even more amazing no superiority complex because he had succeeded despite that lack.”

“I will look after you and I will look after anybody you say needs to be looked after, any way you say. I am here. I brought my whole self to you. I am your mother.”

“You can only become great at something you are willing to sacrifice for”

“If I insist on being pessimistic, there is always tomorrow. Today I am blessed.”

“To grow up is to stop putting blame on parents”

“Since time is the one immaterial object which we cannot influence—neither speed up nor slow down, add to nor diminish—it is an imponderably valuable gift.”

“You dwell in whitened castles
with deep and poisoned moats
and cannot hear the curses
which fill your children's throats.”

“I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it.”

“There are some nights when
sleep plays coy,
aloof and disdainful.
And all the wiles
that I employ to win
its service to my side
are useless as wounded pride,
and much more painful.”

“I find relief from the questions only when I concede that I am not obliged to know everything. I remind myself it is sufficient to know what I know, and that what I know, may not always be true.”

“In all my work what I try to say is that as human beings we are more alike than we are unalike.”

“You only are free when you realize you belong no place — you belong every place — no place at all.”

“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.”

“I had read a Tale of Two Cities and found it up to my standards as a romantic novel. She opened the first page and I heard poetry for the first time in my life… her voice slid in and curved down trough and over the words. She was nearly singing.”

“I don't believe an accident of birth makes people sisters or brothers. It makes them siblings, gives them mutuality of parentage. Sisterhood and brotherhood is a condition people have to work at.”

“If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude.”

“Courage is the most important of all the virtues, because without courage you can't practice any other virtue consistently. You can practice any virtue erratically, but nothing consistently without courage.”

“No human being can be more human than another human being. I liberate you from my ignorance.”

“I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.”

“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 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 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.”