Quotes About Resilience

I wanted to raise the voice of a lot of the people that I knew growing up, and this was, for the most part, poor people who had extraordinary dreams but also very amazing obstacles.

Ever since I came to Congress in 1992, there are those who have been trying to silence my voice. I've been told to 'sit down and shut up' over and over again. Well, I won't sit down and I won't shut up until the full and unvarnished truth is placed before the American people.

I could have hidden in Boston and lived at home for three years, gone through my transition, taken voice lessons to make my voice more feminine, gotten gender reassignment surgery, and spent time to complete my transition, but I didn't want to wait. I wanted to be in the world.

I went from buying my own condominium and a car for myself when I was 17 on 'The Facts of Life' to not being able to pay my rent. I was at the unemployment office all the time. I had to sell my record collection just to make ends meet. And then I started getting these voice-over jobs.

In 'Off to War, Voices of Soldier's Children,' kids from Canada and the United States talk about what it is like when their mother or father goes off to war - and comes home again.

I always appreciate people's opinions, but sometimes I have to take a step back and remember why I'm writing and what I want to do with it. Shutting out the voices is difficult but it's been good for me.

I established early what I was and wasn't willing to accept. People tried to say what I had to do, whether it be pop or R&B, to be successful. Even when I was in the girl group, they would try to make our voices sound very radio-friendly and fit that mold. But even before I got signed, I knew who I was and who I wanted to be.

What's happened in my career has been about knowing myself and realizing my flaws are my strengths, and to embrace them; to access what I'm really good at, and what I'm not so good at; and tune out the voices that get inside your head and make you think you can't do something.

Maya Angelou, the famous African American poet, historian, and civil rights activist who is hailed be many as one of the great voices of contemporary literature, believes a struggle only makes a person stronger.

Sometimes it's other people's voices you have to shut out.

Plus, I've always felt that, if the worst came to the worst in my career, I could always fall back to doing voices on the radio.

We have to fight twice as hard, three times as hard - not only as conservatives, but frankly, as women - to have our voices heard.

The women like us because we're the first real women rappers, and the men like us because we're strong. We're not some soft little rappers with soft little voices. The men who see us end up going, 'Hey! They're kickin' it!'

The power of storytelling - of elevating the voices and examples of incredible leaders who have overcome odd after odd - remains absolute.

When I was a child, women spoke to me of how all they had was their memories, how their husbands went to war and never came back, so many tragedies. That chorus of voices filled my consciousness. It was part of life itself.

Death Row is a bridge out of that ghetto world, giving voices to those people society thinks shouldn't be heard.

The sad reality of it is, as black artists in the industry, we still have to work 10 times harder to get our voices out there.

As I traveled around the country on a book tour for 'In Harm's Way,' I began learning how certain Indianapolis survivors had heard these voices - not necessarily the voice of God, but often that of someone who had fostered them and imparted an identity as a person who doesn't quit.

I tried to listen to way too many voices in my first stint as a head coach. The second time around, I know what I want and how I want to do it.

I know how difficult it is to be not just a woman, but a black woman, and I know how much we get attacked and our voices aren't heard. I experience it every single day.

I didn't miss training because it had become so painful for me. I filled the void pretty quickly as I went straight into coaching and it was great; I had to start learning all over again, and then when I went into TV I knew nothing about it so I had to start from the very beginning.

When Nina Simone first sings the title of 'Feeling Good,' her voice has been alone for thirty-nine seconds. The solitary singer: there's always something fiat lux about it. Resolute, the individual moves through the void. You know the accompaniment is coming, but the voice, all by itself, makes you care about it: form turns into feeling.

I've always been criticised, but the important, that's what my team thinks. Others, I don't care about their opinion; they speak in the void. Social networks give them a voice, but I don't listen it.

This beautiful, messy, wonderful and volatile world of ours needs more heroes.