Maya Angelou > Quotes

“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.”
― Maya Angelou

“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.”
― Maya Angelou

“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”
― Maya Angelou

“If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude. Don't complain.”
― Maya Angelou

“A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song.”
― Maya Angelou

“I've learned that no matter what happens, or how bad it seems today, life does go on, and it will be better tomorrow. 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 regardless of your relationship with your parents, you'll miss them when they're gone from your life. I've learned that making a "living" is not the same thing as making a "life." I've learned that life sometimes gives you a second chance. 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 something back. I've learned that whenever I decide something with an open heart, I usually make the right decision. I've learned that even when I have pains, I don't have to be one. 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've learned that I still have a lot to learn. 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.”
― Maya Angelou

“The first time someone shows you who they are, believe them.”
― Maya Angelou

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

“Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it.”
― Maya Angelou

“I've learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way (s)he handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights.”
― Maya Angelou

“We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.”
― Maya Angelou

“Music was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness.”
― Maya Angelou

“My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style”
― Maya Angelou

“I love to see a young girl go out and grab the world by the lapels. Life's a bitch. You've got to go out and kick ass.”
― Maya Angelou

“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.”
― Maya Angelou

“Courage: the most important of all the virtues because without courage, you can't practice any other virtue consistently.”
― Maya Angelou

“Ask for what you want and be prepared to get it!”
― Maya Angelou

“If I am not good to myself, how can I expect anyone else to be good to me?”
― Maya Angelou

“Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.”
― Maya Angelou, Phenomenal Woman: Four Poems Celebrating Women

“Be a rainbow in someone else's cloud.”
― Maya Angelou, Letter to My Daughter

“A woman's heart should be so hidden in God that a man has to seek Him just to find her.”
― Maya Angelou

“Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.”
― Maya Angelou

“When you know better you do better.”
― Maya Angelou

“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.”
― Maya Angelou

“You alone are enough. You have nothing to prove to anybody.”
― Maya Angelou

“I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better.”
― Maya Angelou

“There's a world of difference between truth and facts. Facts can obscure truth.”
― Maya Angelou

“Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading, to make reading one of his deep and continuing needs, is good for him.”
― Maya Angelou

“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!”
― Maya Angelou

“Everything in the universe has a rhythm, everything dances. ”
― Maya Angelou

“I've learned that even when I have pains, I don't have to be one.”
― Maya Angelou

“Life is pure adventure, and the sooner we realize that, the quicker we will be able to treat life as art.”
― Maya Angelou

“When you learn, teach, when you get, give.”
― Maya Angelou

“Never make someone a priority when all you are to them is an option.”
― Maya Angelou

“Have enough courage to trust love one more time and always one more time.”
― Maya Angelou

“Love recognizes no barriers. It jumps hurdles, leaps fences, penetrates walls to arrive at its destination full of hope.”
― Maya Angelou

“Bitterness is like cancer. It eats upon the host. But anger is like fire. It burns it all clean.”
― Maya Angelou

“The desire to reach for the stars is ambitious. The desire to reach hearts is wise.”
― Maya Angelou

“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

“I don't trust anyone who doesn't laugh.”
― Maya Angelou

“We need much less than we think we need.”
― Maya Angelou

“Surviving is important. Thriving is elegant.”
― Maya Angelou

“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.”
― Maya Angelou

“Hate, it has caused a lot of problems in the world, but has not solved one yet.”
― Maya Angelou

“Hoping for the best, prepared for the worst, and unsurprised by anything in between.”
― Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

“Most people don't grow up. Most people age. They find parking spaces, honor their credit cards, get married, have children, and call that maturity. What that is, is aging.”
― Maya Angelou

“My great hope is to laugh as much as I cry; to get my work done and try to love somebody and have the courage to accept the love in return.”
― Maya Angelou

“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. So you say to people who you think you may have injured, 'I'm sorry,' and then you say to yourself, 'I'm sorry.' If we all hold on to the mistake, we can't see our own glory in the mirror because we have the mistake between our faces and the mirror; we can't see what we're capable of being. You can ask forgiveness of others, but in the end the real forgiveness is in one's own self. I think that young men and women are so caught by the way they see themselves. Now mind you. When a larger society sees them as unattractive, as threats, as too black or too white or too poor or too fat or too thin or too sexual or too asexual, that's rough. But you can overcome that. The real difficulty is to overcome how you think about yourself. If we don't have that we never grow, we never learn, and sure as hell we should never teach.”
― Maya Angelou

“Nothing can dim the light which shines from within.”
― Maya Angelou

“I've learned that regardless of your relationship with your parents, you'll miss them when they're gone from your life.”
― Maya Angelou