Chi > Chi's Quotes

“I am listening to what fear teaches. I will never be gone. I am a scar, a report from the frontlines, a talisman, a resurrection, a rough place on the chin of complacency.”
― Audre Lorde, A Burst of Light

“Our dead line our dreams, their deaths becoming more and more commonplace.”
― Audre Lorde, A Burst of Light

“How are we persuaded to participate in our own destruction by maintaining our silences?”
― Audre Lorde, A Burst of Light

“How is the systematic erosion of freedoms gradually accomplished? What kind of gradual erosion of our status as United States citizens will Black people be persuaded first to ignore and then to accept?”
― Audre Lorde, A Burst of Light

“The subject of revolution is ourselves, is our lives.”
― Audre Lorde, A Burst of Light

“I want to write down everything I know about being afraid, but I’d probably never have enough time to write anything else.”
― Audre Lorde, A Burst of Light

“You cannot, you cannot use someone else's fire. You can only use your own. And in order to do that, you must first be willing to believe that you have it.”
― Audre Lorde

“Neither love nor terror makes one blind: indifference makes one blind.”
― James Baldwin, If Beale Street Could Talk

“The place in which I'll fit will not exist until I make it.”
― James Baldwin

“We can disagree and still love each other unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist.”
― James Baldwin

“The purpose of art is to lay bare the questions that have been hidden by the answers.”
― James Baldwin

“...love brought you here. If you trusted love this far, don't panic now.”
― James Baldwin, If Beale Street Could Talk

“We have to consciously study how to be tender with each other until it becomes a habit.”
― Audre Lorde

“Did you ever read my words, or did you merely finger through them for quotations which you thought might valuably support an already conceived idea concerning some old and distorted connection between us?”
― Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches

“How many times have we tried to stand up fully only for them to tell us that we're being violent for just trying to be whole, that our attempted wholeness was hurting them? They've lied to us for such a long time. And I think when we've been taught to be afraid of ourselves in such ways, we absorb some of our teachers' fear.”
― Akwaeke Emezi, Dear Senthuran: A Black Spirit Memoir

“We are more powerful than we believe.”
― Tricia Hersey, Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto

“Your body is a site of liberation. It doesn’t belong to capitalism. Love your body. Rest your body. Move your body. Hold your body.”
― Tricia Hersey, Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto

“Fear and scarcity are a big part of how the culture keeps us bound up in the hamster wheel.”
― Tricia Hersey, Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto

“Survival is not the end goal for liberation. We must thrive. We must rest.”
― Tricia Hersey, Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto

“Rest is radical because it disrupts the lie that we are not doing enough. It shouts: “No, that is a lie. I am enough. I am worthy now and always because I am here.”
― Tricia Hersey, Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto

“To be loving is to be open to grief, to be touched by sorrow, even sorrow that is unending.”
― bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“There can be no love without justice.”
― Bell Hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“To love somebody is not just a strong feeling - it's a decision, it's a judgement, it's a promise.”
― bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“Remember, care is a dimension of love, but simply giving care does not mean we are loving.”
― Bell Hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“We are encouraged to see honest people as naive, as potential losers.”
― Bell Hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“The widespread assumption that ethical behavior takes the fun out of life is false. In actuality, living ethically ensures that relationships in our lives, including encounters with strangers, nurture our spiritual growth.”
― Bell Hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“The essence of true love is mutual recognition-two individuals seeing each other as they really are. We all know that the usual approach is to meet someone we like and put our best self forward, or even at times a false self, one we believe will be more appealing to the person we want to attract. When our real self appears in its entirety, when the good behavior becomes too much to maintain or the masks are taken away, disappointment comes. All too often individuals feel, after the fact-when feelings are hurt and hearts are broken-that it was a case of mistaken identity, that the loved one is a stranger. They saw what they wanted to see rather than what was really there.”
― bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“When we are loving, we openly and honestly express care, affection, responsibility, respect, commitment, and trust.”
― bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“There can be no love without justice. Until we live in a culture that no only respects but also upholds basic civil rights for children, most children will not know love.”
― bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“Keeping people in a constant state of lack, in perpetual desire, strengthens the marketplace economy.”
― Bell Hooks, All About Love: New Visions