I like to make people feel happy and superior in their reaction towards my appearance.

Things do not always happen the way I would like them to happen, and I had better get used to that.

I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who will have sought and found how to serve.

As men are not able to fight against death, misery, ignorance, they have taken it into their heads, in order to be happy, not to think of them at all.

I know that I’m not the easiest person to live with. The challenge I put on myself is so great that the person I live with feels himself challenged. I bring a lot to bear, and I don’t know how not to.

I came up from a difficult background.

In Hollywood a girl’s virtue is much less important than her hairdo.

He who has faith has… an inward reservoir of courage, hope, confidence, calmness, and assuring trust that all will come out well – even though to the world it may appear to come out most badly.

If you want to have sustained joy, you have to not only make sure that you think right, but you also have to make decisions now that are going to guarantee some joy in the future.

I would say things like ‚I am the greatest! I’m pretty! If you talk jive, you’ll drop in five! I float like a butterfly, sting like a bee! I’m pretty!‘ When white people heard me talking like this, some said, ‚That black man talks too much. He’s bragging.‘

To teach how to live without certainty and yet without being paralysed by hesitation is perhaps the chief thing that philosophy, in our age, can do for those who study it.

I’ve learned that we all change constantly. It’s rare to find that person who is growing with you in the same way at the same time, who encourages you to grow.

No great deed is done by falterers who ask for certainty.

It was really hard for them to intimidate me. They felt I was intimidating. One of the growers had a name for me: I think it was ‚dragon lady‘ or something like it.

The miracle is not that we do this work, but that we are happy to do it.

I need to keep working on myself for a while.

Nobody can give you wiser advice than yourself.

I have learned to know God. I have recast my social belief… All my admirers are married; most of my friends are dead; and I stand with all the world before me, where to choose a path to make in it.

I write for myself things that I’ve gone through.

Vulnerability is the birthplace of connection and the path to the feeling of worthiness. If it doesn’t feel vulnerable, the sharing is probably not constructive.

For me, it’s about the way I carry myself and the way I treat other people. My relationship and how I feel about God and what He does for me, is something deeply personal. It’s where I came from, my family, I was brought up in a religious household and that’s very important to me.

Remember that your imagination is yours and yours alone. You have the inborn capacity to use it in any way that you choose. No one else is responsible for your imagination. Anything placed in your imagination and held there ultimately becomes your reality.

My only fault is that I don’t realize how great I really am.

Relationships are the hallmark of the mature person.

I’m crazy, but I’m not too crazy.

Some people can just let things go, but I can’t, especially if there’s something that worries me or makes me sad.

The expression a woman wears on her face is far more important than the clothes she wears on her back.

I think the tiniest little thing can change the course of your day, which can change the course of your year, which can change who you are.

The nice thing is that when people come up to me, it’s the football they remember, not all the other rubbish.

People gonna be they own individuals and have they own worlds and I can’t knock it.

I am not designed to come second or third. I am designed to win.

The more you seek the uncomfortable, the more you will become comfortable.

You can’t be happy by doing something groovy.

If someone you know makes a bad decision or uses bad judgment, it doesn’t mean you have to allow that to alter your attitude. Why should you allow anyone else’s bad decisions to send you into a tailspin of misery?

Happiness is found in doing, not merely possessing.

I’m tender on the inside.

Wishing to be friends is quick work, but friendship is a slow ripening fruit.

The greatest gift that you can give to others is the gift of unconditional love and acceptance.

I don’t want to be too critical of what other people do, but when people go back to do the same thing that they did, I’m completely confused. I’m like, ‚Didn’t you make that movie already?‘ I’ve been very fortunate, and I’m well taken care of, so the least I can do is try to go forward.

None but ourselves can free our minds.

It’s very hard to find your own words – and you don’t actually exist until you have your own words.

To accuse others for one’s own misfortunes is a sign of want of education. To accuse oneself shows that one’s education has begun. To accuse neither oneself nor others shows that one’s education is complete.

Help others and give something back. I guarantee you will discover that while public service improves the lives and the world around you, its greatest reward is the enrichment and new meaning it will bring your own life.

It seems the older you get, the more life comes into focus.

You gotta keep trying to find your niche and trying to fit into whatever slot that’s left for you or to make one of your own.

I don’t tell people, ‚You’re okay the way that you are.‘ That’s not the right story. The right story is, ‚You’re way less than you could be.‘

By indignities men come to dignities.

The fame thing is interesting because I never wanted to be famous, and I never dreamt I would be famous.

I’ve been careful in love. I’ve been careless in love. And I’ve had adventures I wouldn’t trade for anything.

For beautiful eyes, look for the good in others; for beautiful lips, speak only words of kindness; and for poise, walk with the knowledge that you are never alone.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.

Do not give in too much to feelings. A overly sensitive heart is an unhappy possession on this shaky earth.

What I love best in life is new starts.

The only really happy folk are married women and single men.

The closest I ever came to getting married was just before I started singing. In fact, my first record saved my neck.

For the general public or psychos on Facebook, for everyone who’s made one negative comment about me, I’ve probably gotten 250-300 positive comments.

A wise man will make haste to forgive, because he knows the true value of time, and will not suffer it to pass away in unnecessary pain.

When I look back on my life as a whole, it is impossible for me not to feel blessed.

All the world is full of suffering. It is also full of overcoming.

In South Korea, they believe that when you turn 60, you’ve become a baby again and the rest of your life should be totally about joy and happiness, and people should leave you alone, and I just think that that’s the height of intelligence.

Especially for those of us who lived in single cells, you had the time to sit down and think, and we discovered that sitting down just to think is one of the best ways of keeping yourself fresh and able, to be able to address the problems facing you, and you had the opportunity, also, of examining your past.