Success is not easy and I think everyone should know that hard work and perseverance and being open to giving back are so much more powerful than stepping all over people to get to the top.

You can do anything you want, even if you are being told negative things.stay strong and find motivation.

The best piece of advice that I remember probably on a daily basis is to accept everything about me that is different. That is what makes me special.

You can dream big and it doesn't matter what you look like, where you come from.

My body is very different from most of the dancers I dance with. My hair is different than most I dance with. But I didn't let that stop me. Black girls rock and can be ballerinas.

The path to your success is not as fixed and inflexible as you think.

You're always working to improve, and you're always being critiqued on your next performance. It's not about what you've done. There's always room to grow.

I just try to approach every opportunity on stage, as if it's my first time and my last time.

I feel like I represent every young dancer, and even non-dancer, who felt they were not accepted by the ballet world. I'd like to think that they can see themselves in me.

There are muscles that we have in our feet that most human beings don't even know that we have. The strength that we have is so detailed.

I think that training is the key, definitely, and I devoted my life to it.

You can't be afraid of stepping on toes if you want to go dancing.

The moon in her chariot of pearl

Gray hairs are signs of wisdom if you hold your tongue, speak and they are but hairs, as in the young.

I used to sing when I was younger. I left it alone for a long time, 'cause I was like, I don't even know if I know how to sing for real.

If ye live enough befure thirty ye won't care to live at all afther fifty.

Talent is nothing but long impatience.

My writing is a process of rewriting, of going back and changing and filling in. in the rewriting process you discover what's going on, and you go back and bring it up to that point.

A painting with a message does not happen by accident. It happens when you place elements in their order of importance.

There are substitutes for oil; there is no substitute for fresh water.

You don't become what you want, you become what you believe.