Elena > Elena's Quotes

“I myself cried when I got angry, then became unable to explain why I was angry in the first place. Later I would discover this was endemic among female human beings. Anger is supposed to be "unfeminine" so we suppress it -until it overflows. I could see that not speaking up made my mother feel worse. This was my first hint of the truism that depression is anger turned inward; thus women are twice as likely to be depressed. My mother paid a high price for caring so much, yet being able to do so little about it. In this way, she led me toward am activist place where she herself could never go.”
― Gloria Steinem, My Life on the Road

“Long before all these divisions were opened between home and the road, betweens a woman's place and a man's world, humans followed the crops, the seasons, traveling with their families, our companions, animals, our tents. We built campfires and moved from place to place. This way of traveling is still in our cellular memory. Living things have evolved as travelers, Even migrating birds know that nature doesn't demand a choice between nesting and flight.”
― Gloria Steinem, My Life on the Road

“You should write about take no-shit women like me. Girls need to know they can break the rules" p.79”
― Gloria Steinem, My Life on the Road

“Always ask the turtle.”
― Gloria Steinem

“Swiftboating enters the English language as a verb that means attacking strength instead of weakness. In feminist and other social justice contexts, this has long been called trashing, attacking leaders for daring to write, speak, or lead at all. Taking away the good is even more lethal than pointing out the bad. p.189”
― Gloria Steinem, My Life on the Road

“Laughter is a rescue. p.204”
― Gloria Steinem, My Life on the Road

“You're always the person you were when you were born," she says impatiently. "You just keep finding new ways to express it.”
― Gloria Steinem, My Life on the Road

“One must dare to be happy. ”
― Gertrude Stein

“If you was my wife, she say, I'd cover you up with kisses stead of licks, and work hard for you too.”
― Alice Walker, The Color Purple

“Never argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience.”
― Mark Twain

“Anybody who is experiencing something is more expert in it than the experts.”
― Gloria Steinem, My Life on the Road

“Once we give up searching for approval we often find it easier to earn respect.”
― Gloria Steinem

“so whatever you want to do, just do it...Making a damn fool of yourself is absolutely essential.”
― Gloria Steinem

“I'm pore, I'm black, I may be ugly and can't cook, a voice say to everything listening. But I'm here.”
― Alice Walker, The Color Purple

“Everything want to be loved. Us sing and dance and holler, just trying to be loved.”
― Alice Walker, The Color Purple

“One of the best guides to how to be self-loving is to give ourselves the love we are often dreaming about receiving from others. There was a time when I felt lousy about my over-forty body, saw myself as too fat, too this, or too that. Yet I fantasized about finding a lover who would give me the gift of being loved as I am. It is silly, isn't it, that I would dream of someone else offering to me the acceptance and affirmation I was withholding from myself. This was a moment when the maxim "You can never love anybody if you are unable to love yourself" made clear sense. And I add, "Do not expect to receive the love from someone else you do not give yourself.”
― Bell Hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“To return to love, to get the love we always wanted but never had, to have the love we want but are not prepared to give, we seek romantic relationships. We believe these relationships, more than any other, will rescue and redeem us. True love does have the power to redeem but only if we are ready for redemption. Love saves us only if we want to be saved.”
― bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“S-ar putea întâmpla fel de fel de miracole, continuase el fără s-o privească. Dar trebuie să te înveţe cineva cum să le priveşti, ca să ştii că sunt miracole. Altminteri, nici măcar nu le vezi. Treci pe lângă ele şi nu ştii că sunt miracole. Nu le vezi...”
― Mircea Eliade, Noaptea de Sânziene