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I believe what I have to say is important, and I believe the people coming to hear me are important, and so the occasion of itself alone has an importance, which forces me to stare down my nerves.

Maya Angelou

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Maya Angelou
Age: 86 †
Born: 1928
Born: April 4
Died: 2014
Died: May 28
Author
Autobiographer
Comedian
Dancer
Essayist
Film Director
Film Producer
Human Rights Activist
Journalist
Novelist
Playwright
Politician
St. Louis
Missouri
Marguerite Annie Johnson
Marguerite Johnson
Marguerite Ann Johnson
Marguerite Anne Johnson
Alone
Occasion
Force
Nerves
Important
Staring
Believe
Occasions
People
Forces
Importance
Coming
Hear
Stare

More quotes by Maya Angelou

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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.
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Do not be wedded forever to fear, yoked eternally to brutishness.
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No one can take the place of a friend, no one.
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Christians already? It seems to me that it takes a lifetime of work.
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Listen to yourself and in that quietude you might hear the voice of God.
Maya Angelou
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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.'
Maya Angelou
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Everyone grows old but not everyone grows up.
Maya Angelou
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If growing up is painful for the Southern Black girl, being aware of her displacement is the rust on the razor that threatens the throat. It is an unnecessary insult.
Maya Angelou
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And one of my absolute favorite quotes of all-time, one that I've adopted as one of my greatest life mottos: Life loves to be taken by the lapel and told: I'm with you kid. Let's go.
Maya Angelou
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Troubles are a blessing that force you to change, to believe.
Maya Angelou
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When I love somebody, I like him to be around I like him to take me out to dinner I like to look at the sunset with him. But if not, I love him and I hope he's looking at the same sun I am. Loving someone liberates the lover as well as the beloved. And that kind of love comes with age. Some of this wisdom came to me after I was 50 or 60.
Maya Angelou
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Early on, I was so impressed with Charles Dickens. I grew up in the South, in a little village in Arkansas, and the whites in my town were really mean, and rude. Dickens, I could tell, wouldn't be a man who would curse me out and talk to me rudely.
Maya Angelou
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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. And then that's how you get to know yourself. You say, hmm, I can get up!
Maya Angelou
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You have to develop ways so that you can take up for yourself, and then you take up for someone else. And so sooner or later, you have enough courage to really stand up for the human race and say, 'I'm a representative. '
Maya Angelou
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First best is falling in love. Second best is being in love. Least best is falling out of love. But any of it is better than never having been in love.
Maya Angelou
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Love liberates. It doesn't just hold - that's ego. Love liberates. It doesn't bind.
Maya Angelou
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Only equals make friends, every other relationship is contrived and off balance.
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The sisters and brothers that you meet give you the materials which your character uses to build itself. It is said that some people are born great, others achieve it, some have it thrust upon them. In truth, the ways in which your character is built have to do with all three of those. Those around you, those you choose, and those who choose you.
Maya Angelou
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The more you know of your history, the more liberated you are.
Maya Angelou
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If we are bold, love strikes away the chains of fear from our souls.
Maya Angelou