Maya Angelou Life Quotations [Page 2]

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

I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better.

Surviving is important. Thriving is elegant.

Be present in all things and thankful for all things.

Prejudice is a burden that confuses the past, threatens the future and renders the present inaccessible.

Women should be tough, tender, laugh as much as possible, and live long lives.

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.'

There were people who went to sleep last night, poor and rich and white and black, but they will never wake again. And those dead folks would give anything at all for just five minutes of this weather or ten minutes of plowing. So you watch yourself about complaining. What you're supposed to do when you don't like a thing is change it. If you can't change it, change the way you think about it.

Wouldn't take nothing for my journey now.

Life loves to be taken by the lapel and told: 'I'm with you kid. Let's go.'

I was born in St. Louis but lived there just for a few minutes in my life.

I thank God I'm myself and for the life I'm given to live and for friends and lovers and beloveds, and I thank God for knowing that all those people have already paid for me.

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.

My wish for you is that you continue. Continue to be who and how you are, to astonish a mean world with your acts of kindness.

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.

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

The question is not how to survive, but how to thrive with passion, compassion, humor and style.

I respect myself and insist upon it from everybody. And because I do it, I then respect everybody, too.

My life has been one great big joke, A dance that's walked, A song that's spoke, I laugh so hard I almost choke, When I think about myself.

At one time in my life, from the time I was seven until I was about 13, I didn't speak. I only spoke to my brother. The reason I didn't speak: I had been molested, and I told the name of the molester to my brother who told it to the family.

I know that one of the great arts that the writer develops is the art of saying, 'No. No, I'm finished. Bye.' And leaving it alone. I will not write it into the ground. I will not write the life out of it. I won't do that.

If you want what you're saying heard, then take your time and say it so that the listener will actually hear it. You might save somebody's life. Your own, first.

love life, engage in it, give it all you've got. love it with a passion, because life truly does give back, many times over, what you put into it