Audre Lorde Quotes
It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences.
When I dare to be powerful - to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid.
Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.
When we speak we are afraid our words will not be heard or welcomed. But when we are silent, we are still afraid. So it is better to speak.
If I didn't define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other people's fantasies for me and eaten alive.
I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.
Tomorrow belongs to those of us who conceive of it as belonging to everyone; who lend the best of ourselves to it, and with joy.
I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood.
If I cannot air this pain and alter it, I will surely die of it. That's the beginning of social protest.
Institutionalized rejection of difference is an absolute necessity in a profit economy which needs outsiders as surplus people.
Unless one lives and loves in the trenches, it is difficult to remember that the war against dehumanization is ceaseless.
The true focus of revolutionary change is never merely the oppressive situations that we seek to escape, but that piece of the oppressor which is planted deep within each of us.
Once we recognize what it is we are feeling, once we recognize we can feel deeply, love deeply, can feel joy, then we will demand that all parts of our lives produce that kind of joy.
In other words, I would be giving in to a myth of sameness which I think can destroy us.
Sometimes we are blessed with being able to choose the time, and the arena, and the manner of our revolution, but more usually we must do battle where we are standing.
I have come to believe that caring for myself is not self-indulgent. Caring for myself is an act of survival.
We tend to think of the erotic as an easy, tantalizing sexual arousal. I speak of the erotic as the deepest life force, a force which moves us toward living in a fundamental way.
I realize that if I wait until I am no longer afraid to act, write, speak, be, I'll be sending messages on a Ouija board, cryptic complaints from the other side
It is not the destiny of Black America to repeat white America's mistakes. But we will, if we mistake the trappings of success in a sick society for the signs of a meaningful life.
...and that visibility which makes us most vulnerable is that which also is the source of our greatest strength.
...my experience with people who tried to label me was that they usually did it to either dismiss me or use me.
What woman here is so enamored of her own oppression that she cannot see her heel print upon another woman's face?
I was going to die, if not sooner, then later, whether or not I had ever spoken myself. My silences had not protected me. Your silence will not protect you.
Nothing I accept about myself can be used against me to diminish me.
When you reach out and touch other human beings, it doesn't matter whether you call it therapy or teaching or poetry.
I want to live the rest of my life, however long or short, with as much sweetness as I can decently manage, loving all the people I love, and doing as much as I can of the work I still have to do.
I am still learning - how to take joy in all the people I am, how to use all my selves in the service of what I believe, how to accept when I fail and rejoice when I succeed.
In our work and in our living, we must recognize that difference is a reason for celebration and growth, rather than a reason for destruction.
I started writing because I had a need inside of me to create something that was not there
