Quotes by Activists - Page 47

Humanity needs heroic leadership from those who see all life as precious.
Bryant McGill
We are drawn towards a thing, either because there is some good we are seeking from it, or because we cannot do without it. Sometimes the two motives coincide. Often however they do not. Each is distinct and quite independent. We eat distasteful food, if we have nothing else, because we cannot do otherwise. A moderately greedy man looks out for delicacies, but he can easily do without them. If we have no air we are suffocated, we struggle to get it, not because we expect to get some advantage from it but because we need it. We go in search of sea air without being driven by any necessity, because we like it. In time it often comes about automatically that the second motive takes the place of the first. This is one of the great misfortunes of our race. A man spokes opium in order to attain to a special condition, which he thinks superior; often, as time goes on, the opium reduces him to a miserable condition which he feels to be degrading; but he is no longer able to do without it.
Simone Weil
If three steps are taken without any other motive than the desire to obey God, those three steps are miraculous; they are equally so whether they take place on dry land or on water.
Simone Weil
I realized that in refusing to take a vow man was drawn into temptation, and that to be bound by a vow was like a passage from libertinism to a real monogamous marriage. 'I believe in effort, I do not want to bind myself with vows' is the mentality of weakness and betrays a subtle desire for the thing to be avoided. Or where can be the difficulty in making a final decision? I vow to flee from the serpent which I know will bite me, I do not simply make an effort to flee from him. I know that mere effort may mean certain death. Mere effort means ignorance of the certain fact that the serpent is bound to kill me. The fact, therefore, that I could rest content with an effort only means that I have not yet clearly realized the necessity of definite action. 'But supposing my views are changed in the future, how can I bind myself by a vow?' Such a doubt often deters us. But that doubt also betrays a lack of clear perception that a particular thing must be renounced. That is why Nishkulanand has sung: 'Renunciaton without aversion is not lasting.' Where therefore the desire is gone, a vow of renunciation is the natural and inevitable fruit.
M.K Gandhi
We treat desire as a problem to be solved, address what desire is for and focus on that something and how to acquire it rather than on the nature and the sensation of desire, though often it is the distance between us and the object of desire that fills in the space in between with the blue of longing. I wonder sometimes whether with a slight adjustment of perspective it could be cherished as a sensation in its own terms, since it is as inherent to the human condition as blue is to distance?
Rebecca Solnit
Lust for possession and greed has ravaged the soul of humanity like a great cancer, metastasizing throughout society in the form of a nouveau post-human, consumer hedonism.
Bryant McGill
No marketplace, free or otherwise, is good when it fails to consider the basic human state of needs at every stage of life.
Bryant McGill
Any defensiveness is a sign of failure. You can't move forward if you are defensive.
Bryant McGill
Uncommon success is found on the spiritual plane; you can't get there through common convention or following others. Hard work is not enough; many work slavishly-hard for little reward. Intelligence is insufficient; how many educated and brilliant people there are who fail utterly and completely. Goodness is not enough; how many meek and good souls are tilled into the earth like manure by demigods to fertilize their golden crops. There is something more — it is the unseen essential, and everyone has access to it.
Bryant McGill
Ambition can form an impenetrable barrier for those who fail to acknowledge what they already are.
Bryant McGill
The young think that failure is the Siberian end of the line, banishment from all the living, and tend to do what I then did--which was to hide.
James Baldwin
You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.
Maya Angelou
I realize how depraved it was to instill false guilt in an innocent child's conscience, causing a distorted image of life, God, & self, leaving little if any feeling of personal worth.
Mary Griffith
American corporate capitalism is a murder-suicide mission.
Bryant McGill
We're saying the story doesn't end here, that the air in your lungs is there for a reason.
Jamie Tworkowski
Islam is not unusual in having a tradition of martyrs. What is unique to Islam is the tradition of murderous martyrdom, in which the individual martyr simultaneously commits suicide and kills others for religious reasons.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
I realized that it was not as easy to commit suicide as to contemplate it. And since then, whenever I have heard of someone threatening to commit suicide, it has had little or no effect on me.
Mahatma Gandhi
Rory said he loved me but wouldn't hold my hand in public. & he wanted so badly to end the pain, but it never went away, it stayed with the people that loved him.
Christopher Soto
If I had no sense of humor, I would long ago have committed suicide.
Mahatma Gandhi
Wake-up! Think for yourself, be yourself and return to what is real.
Bryant McGill
Patriotism is merely deeply-rooted government brand loyalty.
Bryant McGill
The truth is now as it was yesterday, and as it always will be, that the world is-as we are.
Bryant McGill
It is in the center of a stable self-love that you will find the confidence and safety you want.
Bryant McGill
Every small positive change we make in ourselves repays us in confidence in the future.
Alice Walker
It’s almost like the better I do, the more my feeling of inadequacy actually increases, because I’m just going, ‘Any moment, someone’s going to find out I’m a total fraud, and that I don’t deserve any of what I’ve achieved.’ I can’t possibly live up to what everyone thinks I am and what everyone’s expectations of me are.
Emma Watson
Who can see twenty-five years into the future?” she had asked. “Your guess is as good as theirs. Confidence is everything.
John Perkins
The stories I tell myself about myself are contexts for what I believe is possible. These stories affect not only my attitudes about myself and others, but affect my behavior in what could become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Sharon Weil
I'm young as morningand fresh as dew.Everybody loves meand so do you.
Maya Angelou
The first question we must address deals with optimism, the possibility of achieving our goal. Are we in a position where we can actually hope to effect change? Assuming we become convinced that there are reasons for optimism, we move to the next question. Are we cetain that we want change? The stories about EHMs, jackals, and suffering around the globe strike raw nerves, but now we demand absolute proof that our grievances justify the efforts change will demand. Third: Is there a unifying principle that will validate our efforts? We look to ascertain that we are not merely seeking to impose our moral, religious, or philosophical values on others but instead are intent on creating something of true and lasting universal benefit. And finally: What can we each do? You and I personally need to evaluate our talents and passions. What are our individual options and desires? How do they fit into the bigger picture?
John Perkins
When we oppose oppression, we lift our hands from the collective reins that empower such oppression.
Bryant McGill
Sometimes, it is true, a sense of isolation enfolds me like a cold mist as I sit alone and wait at life’s shut gate. Beyond there is light, and music, and sweet companionship; but I may not enter. Fate, silent, pitiless, bars the way…Silence sits immense upon my soul. Then comes hope with a smile and whispers, ‘there is joy is self-forgetfulness.’ So I try to make the light in others’ eyes my sun, the music in others; ears my symphony, the smile on others’ lips my happiness.
Helen Keller
I believed I was too sensitive and weak. To “prove” I wasn’t a victim anymore, I moved closer to painful experiences rather than away from them. Remaining in harm’s way and exposing myself to more pain kept me in the victim role rather than moving me out of it.
Christina Enevoldsen
Your suffering is there to inspect you and perfect you. We are made complete by our pain.
Bryant McGill
All your troubles, struggles, pains and suffering is worth one good thing.
Bryant McGill
If you don't accept and respect your suffering, it isn't going anywhere.
Bryant McGill
Your suffering needs to be respected.
Bryant McGill
Your pain is reminding you that the gift of life is tender and precious. Suffering cuts to the quick of aliveness.
Bryant McGill
Eons of suffering, brutality and struggle have paved the way through the corridors of time to create this moment, where you exist as an exalted expression of life.
Bryant McGill
Avoiding pain causes endless suffering for you and others. Avoiding pain is really selfishness.
Bryant McGill
Do not be a "go along, get along" person when it comes to the suffering of others. Integrity is not a popularity contest. Stand for love!
Bryant McGill
Are you so dead inside you don't feel the daily anguish, terror and deathly suffering of millions? What happened to you? You've changed.
Bryant McGill
Intelligence is often worshiped, even when that intelligence allows unfathomable injustice and suffering to occur under its smart watch.
Bryant McGill
Your suffering needs to be respected. Don't try to ignore the hurt, because it is real. Just let the hurt soften you instead of hardening you. Let the hurt open you instead of closing you. Let the hurt send you looking for those who will accept you instead of hiding from those who reject you.
Bryant McGill
Out of our suffering we emerge. Our struggles are really our only hope.
Bryant McGill
It would take me a long time to understand how systems inflict pain and hardship in people's lives and to learn that being kind in an unjust system is not enough.
Helen Prejean
I will follow anyoneAnd ask everyoneTo stand together as one nationAgainst the killing of innocent citizens
Widad Akreyi
Day after day, the globalization of terrorism becomes more evident. This is the one of the biggest challenges we are facing. We must stand with the innocent people around the world who are suffering or have lost their loved ones as a result of terrorism.
Widad Akreyi
Theology alone doesn't convine anyone.Only those words which are pregnant with action, theology that is born of suffering, of struggles, of the poor--this theology is a testimony. This theology leads to conversion. (Leonardo Boff, p. 169)
Mev Puleo
I could not feel, smell, see, hear, or taste the world around me. If I had allowed myself to experience these things in all their intensity, I might have lost my mind. If I had allowed myself to cry, I might never have been able to stop. So I survived, but I never felt joy, never felt safe.
Yeonmi Park
I was beginning to think that in life there might be some suffering that was worth enduring.
Ingrid Betancourt
When someone is suffering, there is a deep, visceral reaction in the core of our being, a flood of empathy and a frightfully desperate compulsion to give aid.
Bryant McGill
Love of God is pure when joy and suffering inspire an equal degree of gratitude.
Simone Weil
The world? The world is not interested in us. Today, everything is possible, even the crematoria...
Elie Wiesel
t— This world is full of trouble, umfundisi.—tWho knows it better?—tYet you believe?tKumalo looked at him under the light of the lamp. I believe, he said, but I have learned that it is a secret. Pain and suffering, they are a secret. Kindness and love, they are a secret. But I have learned that kindness and love can pay for pain and suffering. There is my wife, and you, my friend, and these people who welcomed me, and the child who is so eager to be with us here in Ndotsheni – so in my suffering I can believe.— I have never thought that a Christian would be free of suffering, umfundisi. For our Lord suffered. And I come to believe that he suffered, not to save us from suffering, but to teach us how to bear suffering. For he knew that there is no life without suffering.Kumalo looked at his friend with joy. You are a preacher, he said.
Alan Paton
We always cherish and miss the time passed yet struglling for a better future but after moving to next level we feel the past was beautiful
Salman Ahmad
Clear out all of those doubts and fears. Let the past be the past. It's time.
Bryant McGill
You have to get clear in your present life — clear of the junk from your past.
Bryant McGill
Reliving your painful past will poison your heart and your tomorrow.
Bryant McGill
The treasure shouldn't do the hunting, and you're a treasure.
Ed Asner
Drug cartels have taken the driver’s seat, training our youngmen and women on how best to self destruct, while the largercommunity watches on helplessly as these bands of renegades leadour people towards the path of self annihilation
Oche Otorkpa