Quotes from Maya Angelou

I've learned that whenever I decide something with an open heart, I usually make the right decision.

It is this belief in a power larger than myself and other than myself which allows me to venture into the unknown and even the unknowable.

I am a child of God. I always carry that with me.

I want all my senses engaged. Let me absorb the world's variety and uniqueness.

To those who are given much, much is expected.

There is an intimate laughter to be found only among friends

That's what you want to do? Then nothing beats a trial but a failure. Give it everything you've got. I've told you many times, 'Cant do is like Dont Care.' Neither of them have a home.

I thought if I could face the worst danger voluntarily, and triumph, I would forever have power over it.

You can't get too high for somebody to bring you down.

You can't use up creativity. The more you use the more you have.

In so many ways, segregation shaped me, and education liberated me.

If I'm the people's poet, then I ought to be in people's hands - and, I hope, in their heart.

I know that you that you may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. If you accept that you have been defeated, you give power to the force that is trying to defeat you.

Each of us has the power and responsibility to become a rainbow in the clouds.

The happy heart runs with the river, floats on the air, lifts to the music, soars with the eagle, hopes with the prayer.

When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.

I don't believe an accident of birth makes people sisters or brothers. It makes them siblings, gives them mutuality of parentage. Sisterhood and brotherhood is a condition people have to work at.

Original thinking migrates each day in search of nourishment.

Intelligence always had a pornographic influence on me.

Every Day you should reach out and touch someone

Take a month and show some kindness for the folks who thought that blindness was an illness that affected eyes alone.

My grandmother took me to church on Sunday all day long, every Sunday into the night. Then Monday evening was the missionary meeting. Tuesday evening was usher board meeting. Wednesday evening was prayer meeting. Thursday evening was visit the sick. Friday evening was choir practice. I mean, and at all those gatherings, we sang.

I've conducted the Boston Pops! Imagine that! Me! Maya Angelou! I've sang and danced at La Scala!

I wasn't a pretty girl. I was six feet tall at 15, you know.