Famous Quotes & Sayings

Maya Angelou

For a person who grew up in the '30s and '40s in the segregated South, with so many doors closed without explanation to me, libraries and books said, 'Here I am, read me.' Over time I have learned I am at my best around books.

Maya Angelou

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.

Maya Angelou

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

Maya Angelou

I'm grateful to be of use. I will not be misused or abused, but I will be of use to anybody.

Maya Angelou

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.

Maya Angelou

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.

Maya Angelou

Poetry puts starch in your backbone so you can stand, so you can compose your life.

Maya Angelou

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

Maya Angelou

I am overwhelmed by the grace and persistence of my people.

Maya Angelou

Making a decision to write was a lot like deciding to jump into a frozen lake.

Maya Angelou

All men are prepared to accomplish the incredible if their ideals are threatened.

Maya Angelou

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 really love language. I love it for wate it does for us, how it allows us to explain the pain and the glory, the nuances and delicacies of our existence. And then it allows us to laugh, allows us to show wit. Real wit is shown in language. We need language.

Maya Angelou

Each time I write a book, every time I face that yellow pad, the challenge is so great. I have written eleven books, but each time I think, ‘Uh oh, they’re going to find out now. I’ve run a game on everybody and they’re going to find me out.

Sallie Krawcheck

If you're not making some notable mistakes along the way, you're certainly not taking enough business and career chances.

Russell Simmons

It's important to focus on what we do best and master one craft at a time.

Russell Simmons

I've been blessed to find people who are smarter than I am, and they help me to execute the vision I have.

Ruth Reichl

One of the secrets to staying young is to always do things you don't know how to do, to keep learning.

Rumi

Look past your thoughts, so you may drink the pure nectar of This Moment.

Rumi

As you live Deeper in the Heart, the Mirror gets clearer and cleaner.

Rumi

Let silence take you to the core of life.

Rosa Parks

Knowing what must be done does away with fear.

Rosa Parks

I would like to be known as a person who is concerned about freedom and equality and justice and prosperity for all people.

Susan B. Anthony

I think the girl who is able to earn her own living and pay her own way should be as happy as anybody on earth. The sense of independence and security is very sweet.

Sonny Perdue

My philosophy of leadership is to surround myself with good people who have ability, judgment and knowledge, but above all, a passion for service.

Steve Jobs

That's why I think death is the most wonderful invention of life. It purges the system of these old models that are obsolete. I think that's one of Apple's challenges, really. When two young people walk in with the next thing, are we going to embrace it and say this is fantastic? Are you going to be willing to drop our models, or are we going to explain it away? I think we'll do better, because we're completely aware of it and we make it a priority.

Steve Jobs

I think the artistry is in having an insight into what one sees around them. Generally putting things together in a way no one else has before and finding a way to express that to other people who don't have that insight....

Steve Jobs

All we are is our ideas, or people. That's what keeps us going to work in the morning, to hang around these great bright people. I've always thought that recruiting is the heart and soul of what we do.

Steve Jobs

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country.... I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this.... It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating. None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me.

Steve Jobs

I told [Bill Gates] I believed every word of what I said but that I should never have said it in public. I wish him the best, I really do. I just think he and Microsoft are a bit narrow. He'd be a broader guy if he had dropped acid once or gone off to an ashram when he was younger.

Steve Jobs

A lot of people in our industry haven't had very diverse experiences. So they don't have enough dots to connect, and they end up with very linear solutions without a broad perspective on the problem. The broader one's understanding of the human experience, the better design we will have.

Steve Jobs

Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.

Steve Jobs

People think focus means saying yes to the thing you've got to focus on. But that's not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully. I'm actually as proud of the things we haven't done as the things I have done. Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things.

Mira Nair

I want to question what the outside is and who defines it. I often find those that are considered to be on the outside extremely inspiring.