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"35 Audre Lorde Quotes & Sayings

      American     /     View profile
Born: 18 February 1934. Died: 17 November 1992 | Writer | Feminist | Womanist | Librarian | Activist |

We must be the change we wish to see in the world.

We Change Wish See
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Our feelings are our most genuine paths to knowledge.
Feelings Genuine Paths Knowledge
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If I didn't define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other people's fantasies for me and eaten alive.

Define Myself Crunched People's
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Life is very short and what we have to do must be done in the now.
Life Short What Do
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It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences.

Differences Divide Inability Recognize
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I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.

Free Woman Shackles Different
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Nothing I accept about myself can be used against me to diminish me.

Nothing Accept Myself Against me
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I learned so much from listening to people. And all I knew was, the only thing I had was honesty and openness.

Learned Listening People Honesty
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I have come to believe that caring for myself is not self-indulgent. Caring for myself is an act of survival.

Believe Caring Myself Self-indulgent
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Pain is important: how we evade it, how we succumb to it, how we deal with it, how we transcend it.

Pain Important Evade Succumb
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When I dare to be powerful, to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid.

Dare Powerful Strength Service
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In our work and in our living, we must recognize that difference is a reason for celebration and growth, rather than a reason for destruction.

Work Living Recognize Difference
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…and that visibility which makes us most vulnerable is that which also is the source of our greatest strength

Visibility Makes Vulnerable Source
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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.

You Use Someone Willing
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We have to consciously study how to be tender with each other until it becomes a habit.
We Consciously Study Tender
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When times are hard, do something. If it works, do it some more. If it does not work, do something else. But keep going.

Times Hard Do something Works
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Sometimes we are blessed with being able to choose the time, and the arena, and the manner of our revolution, but more usually we must do battle where we are standing.

Sometimes Blessed Choose Time
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You become strong by doing the things you need to be strong for. This is the way genuine learning takes place. That’s a very difficult way to live, but it also has served me. It’s been an asset as well as a liability.

Become Strong Genuine Learning
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We recognize that all knowledge is mediated through the body and that feeling is a profound source of information about our lives.

Recognize Knowledge Mediated Feeling
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Our visions begin with our desires.

Visions Begins Desires
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In the forefront of our move toward change, there is only poetry to hint at possibility made real.

Forefront Change Poetry Possibility
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Difference must be not merely tolerated, but seen as a fund of necessary polarities between which our creativity can spark like a dialectic.

Difference Tolerated Fund Creativity
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I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood.

Believe Important Spoken Risk
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Without community, there is no liberation.

Without Community No Liberation
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We have been raised to fear the yes within ourselves, our deepest cravings.

We Raised Fear Within
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Poetry is the way we help give name to the nameless so it can be thought.

Poetry Way Help Name
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Oppressors always expect the oppressed to extend to them the understanding so lacking in themselves.

Oppressors Expect Extend Understanding
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what you hear in my voice is fury, not suffering. Anger, not moral authority

What Hear Voice Fury
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A choice of pains. That's what living was all about.

Choice Pains Living All about
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Poetry is not only dream and vision; it is the skeleton architecture of our lives. It lays the foundations for a future of change, a bridge across our fears of what has never been before.

Poetry Dream Vision Lives
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The oppression of women knows no ethnic nor racial boundaries, true, but that does not mean it is identical within those boundaries.

Oppression Women Ethnic Racial
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If I do not bring all of who I am to whatever I do, then I bring nothing, or nothing of lasting worth, for I have withheld my essence.

Bring Nothing Worth Witheld
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How are you practicing what you preach—whatever you preach, and who is exactly listening?

How Practicing Preach Listening
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To acknowledge privilege is the first step in making it available for wider use.

Acknowledge Priviledge Making Wider use
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If you want us to change the world someday, we at least have to live long enough to grow up!' shouts the child.

Want Change World Live long
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Audre Lorde Quotes & Sayings