Quotes About Belonging

I grew very skeptical of certain kind of Jewish separatism in my youth. I mean, I saw the Jewish community was always with each other; they didn't trust anybody outside. You'd bring someone home, and the first question was, 'Are they Jewish, are they not Jewish?'

I went to the Glasgow Youth Theatre and they just let me in. But I was so shy that I was there for about six weeks without actually introducing myself.

Youth doesn't need friends - it only needs crowds.

Who I was was not acceptable to black L.A. youth: the way I spoke and my sense of humor. Everybody else had relaxers and pressed hair. I wore my hair in an Afro puff. Nappy. The way I dressed. It was all about name brands at the time in L.A. I had no idea. All those things, I failed miserably at.

The things that I draw on, and the world that I feel part of, aren't particularly youth culture.

I like books that explore identity and youth culture or rites of passage.

When at the CIA, I was fond of saying that many jihadis join the movement for the same reasons that young Americans join the Crips and the Bloods: youthful alienation, the need to belong to something greater than self, the search for meaningful identity. But it also matters what gang you join.

I know one of the reasons I first started making Youtube videos was because no one looks like me.

I started using YouTube when I really wanted to reach out to the world, and I found a group of people who had the same interests as me.

The fact that I am able to put myself out there in this age of social media and YouTube is really a gift to someone who never felt like I fit into any particular mold. One of the reasons people are responding to it is because it is coming from a pure place.

New Zealand is not a small country but a large village.

I am a New Zealander, but I don't want to swallow New Zealand identity in one gulp.

I feel that New Zealand is my second home.

New Zealand is in my heart, always.

When I was a child in the 1940s and early 1950s, my parents and grandparents spoke of Britain as home, and New Zealand had this strong sense of identity and coherence as being part of the commonwealth and a the identity of its people as being British.

When I'm on the court, I feel at peace, really. It feels like my home. I'm always thinking of something creative to do, like trick shots or something like that. It's just something about the basketball court that touches me; it makes me feel like nothing is wrong on the court.

Skaters, I think they tend to be outsiders who seek a sense of belonging, but belonging on their own terms, and real respect is given by how much we take what other guys do, these basic tricks, 360 flips, we take that, we make it our own, and then we contribute back to the community the inner way that edifies the community itself.

Politics is tricky for me. For most of my life, I didn't think it applied to me.

I tried so many times to fit in but I could never ever fit in. I was always like, an outcast.

I can't belong to groups. I've tried. I behave normally, but people don't look at me normally.

I tried to surround myself with people who have accepted me for being me. And I want to create that image to my fans as well. And that's the advice I give to them. To be happy for who you are, and to surround yourself with people who are happy for being you.

My parents - they tried to become American, they tried to become British, they tried to become Scandinavian - nobody wanted them, anywhere.

The one thing I won't do is sacrifice my Indian identity in my music, my clothing choices. It's something I tried to hide growing up, and I would never do that again because it's such a big part of me and I'm very proud of it.

In Arlington, people would laugh at you if you tried to get people to look at your drawings or listen to your poetry. It was like you thought you were special.