When you come from a background like mine, where you're entering worlds that are so different than your own, you have to be afraid.

Success is its own reward, but failure is a great teacher too, and not to be feared.

As you discover what strength you can draw from your community in this world from which it stands apart, look outward as well as inward. Build bridges instead of walls.

I do know one thing about me: I don't measure myself by others' expectations or let others define my worth.

Experience has taught me that you cannot value dreams according to the odds of their coming true. Their real value is in stirring within us the will to aspire.

I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life.

Remember that no one succeeds alone. Never walk alone in your future paths.

Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences...our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging.

Until we reach equality in education, we can't reach equality in the larger society.

The Latina in me is an ember that blazes forever.

There are no bystanders in life [...] Our humanity makes us each a part of something greater than ourselves.

You will never understand the real definition of insanity until the day you are told it is unreasonable for you to feel hurt by the very people that hurt you.

People are not poor because they do not have money

...all I could think about was how both sets of parents had needed to make their decision, on whether to medicate their child, in a scientific vacuum. (p. 35)

It is the infirmity of our nature always to believe ourselves much more unhappy than those who groan by our sides!

Lebanon was under Israeli occupation, up to its capital, but we did not consider that a disaster. Why? Because it was very clear that there are ways to resist.

We have known the bitterness of defeat and the exultation of triumph, and from both we have learned there can be no turning back. We must go forward to preserve in peace what we won in war.

I haven't gotten labeled as a Hispanic actor

The Revolutionary Guard controls almost everything in Iran, and this is hurting the people.

Whatever you give out in life is what you receive back in life.

What you think you know versus what you actually learn.