I’m not concerned with your liking or disliking me… All I ask is that you respect me as a human being.

It is foolish to tear one’s hair in grief, as though sorrow would be made less by baldness.

Many people think of perfectionism as striving to be your best, but it is not about self-improvement; it’s about earning approval and acceptance.

Renunciation remains sorrow, though a sorrow borne willingly.

What I believe is that marriage is between a man and a woman, but what I also believe is that we have an obligation to make sure that gays and lesbians have the rights of citizenship that afford them visitations to hospitals, that allow them to be, to transfer property between partners, to make certain that they’re not discriminated on the job.

You’re imperfect, and you’re wired for struggle, but you are worthy of love and belonging.

I don’t have much positive to say about motor neuron disease, but it taught me not to pity myself because others were worse off, and to get on with what I still could do. I’m happier now than before I developed the condition.

We have a tendency to condemn people who are different from us, to define their sins as paramount and our own sinfulness as being insignificant.

Sometimes, people can be extraordinarily judgmental and closed-minded to anyone different or special, which is why it’s so hard for young people in this day and age to be comfortable enough in their own skin to not listen to the people picking on them.

I am not made for politics because I am incapable of wanting or accepting the death of the adversary.

God is not upset that Gandhi was not a Christian, because God is not a Christian! All of God’s children and their different faiths help us to realize the immensity of God.

I believe in a passion for inclusion.

Freedom is the open window through which pours the sunlight of the human spirit and human dignity.

If you’re going to wake up early all the time, and you’re working hard, and you’re working out, sometimes you’re going to get tired. It’s OK. It’s acceptable – somewhat. We’re all human, unfortunately.

If you realize that all things change, there is nothing you will try to hold on to. If you are not afraid of dying, there is nothing you cannot achieve.

I’m very picky; I’m never happy with anything. It’s so hard to give the record away and accept that you’re done.

We must find our duties in what comes to us, not in what might have been.

We can continue to learn generation after generation and now is time to begin to learn how to love in a non-discriminatory way because we are intelligent enough, but we are not loving enough as a species.

Our country does not believe in the concept of your God and my God. We believe that all gods are one. We have different ways of accepting Him. All ways lead to Him.

When it’s your time, it is your time.

I have some good friends of my own who happen to be gay, and when it comes to gay, straight, or whatever, I’m for anything life-affirmative. I’m for gay power, straight power, male power, female power; everybody should feel empowered without oppressing anyone who’s different.

The thing to do, it seems to me, is to prepare yourself so you can be a rainbow in somebody else’s cloud. Somebody who may not look like you. May not call God the same name you call God – if they call God at all. I may not dance your dances or speak your language. But be a blessing to somebody. That’s what I think.

I’m actually starting to like more and more people who have convictions that are unpopular.

NBC had a show called ‚The Toughest Bouncer in America‘ that I did. But I told them I didn’t like that term, ‚bouncer.‘ To me, it’s offensive. A bouncer likes to get physical, likes to put his hands on people.

Toleration is good for all, or it is good for none.

It is not our purpose to become each other; it is to recognize each other, to learn to see the other and honor him for what he is.

So the bodhisattva saves all beings, not by preaching sermons to them, but by showing them that they are delivered, they are liberated, by the act of not being able to stop changing.

Acceptance looks like a passive state, but in reality it brings something entirely new into this world. That peace, a subtle energy vibration, is consciousness.

I know that a large part of my fan base is gay. They’ve shown me love from the start. I mean in this industry, everyone from my glam people to my dancers are gay. You can’t be homophobic in this line of work – I’m a pop star!

I am not promising that God will give you everything you want. There are times when we want things that God knows would not be good for us.

To love someone means to see him as God intended him.

God tells us not to judge one another, no matter what anyone’s sexual preferences are or if they’re black, brown or purple.

Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.

There are a lot of groups that feel a little bit strange around me, because I am inclusive.

Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.

That we must all die, we always knew; I wish I had remembered it sooner.

I try to very hard to avoid a situation where I would be eating cat or dog; I’ve managed to gracefully avoid that. It’s hypocritical of me and an arbitrary line, but one that I have managed to avoid crossing.

You pray for rain, you gotta deal with the mud too. That’s a part of it.

Real magic in relationships means an absence of judgment of others.

If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.

I’ve been called a moron since I was about four. My father called me a moron. My grandfather said I was a moron. And a lot of times when I’m driving, I hear I’m a moron. I like being a moron.

One of the many lessons that one learns in prison is, that things are what they are and will be what they will be.

We often refuse to accept an idea merely because the tone of voice in which it has been expressed is unsympathetic to us.

I have a strong feeling that I shall be glad when I am dead and done for – scrapped at last to make room for somebody better, cleverer, more perfect than myself.

A man should look for what is, and not for what he thinks should be.

I look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

In order to govern, the question is not to follow out a more or less valid theory but to build with whatever materials are at hand. The inevitable must be accepted and turned to advantage.

I don’t want to write an autobiography because I would become public property with no privacy left.

I think everyone should be with who they love.

The big message of gospel is that you don’t have to keep fighting the universe; you can stop, and the universe is quite good to you. There is a loss of ego.

No man who is occupied in doing a very difficult thing, and doing it very well, ever loses his self-respect.

Perhaps travel cannot prevent bigotry, but by demonstrating that all peoples cry, laugh, eat, worry, and die, it can introduce the idea that if we try and understand each other, we may even become friends.

Shrinking away from death is something unhealthy and abnormal which robs the second half of life of its purpose.

When you put on a uniform, there are certain inhibitions that you accept.

I know who I am, I know what I can and can’t do. I know what I will and won’t do. I know what I’m capable of and I don’t agree to do things that I don’t think I can pull off.

Just as the humble, unassuming, assenting ‚O.K.‘ has deposed the more affirmative ‚Yes,‘ so the little cringe and hesitation and approximation of ‚like‘ are a help to young people who are struggling to negotiate the shoals and rapids of ethnic identity, the street, and general correctness.

Me and my dad are friends. We’re cool. I’ll never be disappointed again, because I don’t expect anything anymore from him. I just let him exist, and that’s how we get along.

In God’s family, there are no outsiders, no enemies.

I was called a terrorist yesterday, but when I came out of jail, many people embraced me, including my enemies, and that is what I normally tell other people who say those who are struggling for liberation in their country are terrorists.

There is no private life which has not been determined by a wider public life.

Real education enhances the dignity of a human being and increases his or her self-respect. If only the real sense of education could be realized by each individual and carried forward in every field of human activity, the world will be so much a better place to live in.