Words in the Midst

While you work:

Courage

Courage comes in different packages and speaks different languages. There is a courage called defiance, and there is a courage called perseverance. There is a courage that shouts and a courage that whispers.”    -Lerone Bennett

Education

Oh, that we might awake to the importance of a thorough, universal education.
– Jennie Carter, 1867

The Future

Look closely at the present you are constructing: it should look like the future you are dreaming.
– Alice Walker

Reading

There couldn’t be a safer way for kids to learn about difficult topics, gain new perspectives, and explore the world and their place in it than by reading words on a page.
– Heather E. Schwartz

Impossible

It always seems impossible until its done.
– Nelson Mandela

Burden

There will be people who say to you, ‘You are out of your lane.’ They are burdened by only having the capacity to see what has always been instead of what can be. But don’t you let that burden you.
– Kamala Harris

Challenge

A strong woman looks a challenge dead in the eye and gives it a wink.

Freedom

Freedom is the right to grow, it is the right to blossom. Freedom is the right to be yourself. – Asata Shakur

Strength

I wanted to show the history and strength of all kinds of black women. Working women, country women, urban women, great women in the history of the United States. – Elizabeth Catlett

Self Love

Loving yourself has nothing to do with being selfish, self-centered or self-engrossed. It means that you accept yourself for what you are. Loving yourself means that you accept responsibility for your own development, growth, and happiness.
– Iyanla Vanzant

Search

In search of my mother’s garden, I found my own.
– Alice Walker

Struggle

The struggle you’re in today is developing the strength you need for tomorrow.
– Robert Tew

Mind

What the mind doesn’t understand, it worships or fears.
– Alice Walker

Do

You must do the things you think you cannot do.
– Eleanor Roosevelt

Voice

It took me quite a long time to develop a voice, and now that I have it. I am not going to be silent.
– Madeleine Albright

Building

You can tell who the strong women are. They are the ones you see building one another up instead of tearing each other down.

Mistakes

Do not fear mistakes. There are none.
– Miles Davis

Questions

The questions that we think face the country are questions which in one sense are much deeper than civil rights. They’re questions which go very much to the bottom of mankind and people. They’re questions which have repercussions in terms of a whole international affairs and relations. They’re questions which go to the very root of our society. What kind of society will we be?
– Bob Moses (activist)

Art

I have always wanted my art to service my people – to reflect us, to relate to us, to stimulate us, to make us aware of our potential. We have to create an art for liberation and for life.
– Elizabeth Catlett

Laugh

A good laugh is better than drugs from apothecaries. – Jennie Carter, 1867

Age

You are not too old and it is not too late to dive into your increasing depths where life calmly gives out its own secret.
– Rainer Maria Rilke

Self

I care not so much what I am to others as what I am to myself.
– Michel de Montaigne

DIY

As award-winning director and big sis Ava DuVernay, said, “If you’re doing something outside of dominant culture, there’s not an easy place for you. You will have to do it yourself.” Whether it is writing a book; crafting a work of art; or creating films — if it’s focused on a Black or Brown woman or girl or a person of color — you can’t wait for permission. You have to make it happen. You have to give yourself permission.

Age too

“Black Women are Totally Smashing It.”
– Bernadine Evaristo

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I am so happy to be alive. There is a reason that I am here today, in this time, in this universe…