Kindness Quotes

“I miss my friends in public school, but it's kind of a part of something that you have to give up. I'd rather perform than go to public school.”

“I've never had anything done on my face. I've never had dermabrasion or peels or injections of any kind, nothing.”

“We will always be black, you and I, even if it means different things in different places. France is built on its own dream, on its collection of bodies, and recall that your very name is drawn from a man who opposed France and its national project of theft by colonization. It is true that our color was not our distinguishing feature there, so much as the Americanness represented in our poor handle on French. And it is true that there is something particular about how the Americans who think they are white regard us—something sexual and obscene. We were not enslaved in France. We are not their particular “problem,” nor their national guilt. We are not their niggers. If there is any comfort in this, it is not the kind that I would encourage you to indulge. Remember your name. Remember that you and I are brothers, are the children of trans-Atlantic rape. Remember the broader consciousness that comes with that. Remember that this consciousness can never ultimately be racial; it must be cosmic. Remember the Roma you saw begging with their children in the street, and the venom with which they were addressed. Remember the Algerian cab driver, speaking openly of his hatred of Paris, then looking at your mother and me and insisting that we were all united under Africa. Remember the rumbling we all felt under the beauty of Paris, as though the city had been built in abeyance of Pompeii. Remember the feeling that the great public gardens, the long lunches, might all be undone by a physics, cousin to our rules and the reckoning of our own country, that we do not fully comprehend.”

“I was given such a great gift. It's a miracle that never stops amazing me and reminding me to give thanks, every day. Having a wife and daughter gives me a lot more purpose. I was much more selfish before, but now I think about what kind of role model I'll be. I just want to be a better man.”

“This kind of forgetting does not erase memory, it lays the emotion surrounding the memory to rest.”

“Getting in touch with the lovelessness within and letting that lovelessness speak its pain is one way to begin again on love's journey. In relationships, whether heterosexual or homosexual, the partner who is hurting often finds that their mate is unwilling to 'hear' the pain. Women often tell me that they feel emotionally beaten down when their partners refuse to listen or talk. When women communicate from a place of pain, it is often characterized as 'nagging.' Sometimes women hear repeatedly that their partners are 'sick of listening to this shit.' Both cases undermine self-esteem. Those of us who were wounded in childhood often were shamed and humiliated when we expressed hurt. It is emotionally devastating when the partners we have chosen will not listen. Usually, partners who are unable to respond compassionately when hearing us speak our pain, whether they understand it or not, are unable to listen because that expressed hurt triggers their own feelings of powerlessness and helplessness. Many men never want to feel helpless or vulnerable. They will, at times, choose to silence a partner with violence rather than witness emotional vulnerability. When a couple can identify this dynamic, they can work on the issue of caring, listening to each other's pain by engaging in short conversations at appropriate times (i.e., it's useless to try and speak your pain to someone who is bone weary, irritable, reoccupied, etc.). Setting a time when both individuals come together to engage in compassionate listening enhances communication and connection. When we are committed to doing the work of love we listen even when it hurts.”

“The best kind of comedy to me is when you make people laugh at things they've never laughed at, and also take a light into the darkened corners of people's minds, exposing them to the light.”

“The kind of gardens I loved as a kid were the ones that were awesome to explore and get lost in, the ones that let you use your imagination. You can only achieve that when you're not plugged into the online world: it gives you time to think and come up with ideas.”

“Christmas teaches us to be loving, kind, giving, forgiving, and appreciating.”

“Yeah – Sure I rememberMatter of fact it was just last SeptemberShe still calls it the fall to rememberLittle Heather when it all came togetherYou remember the first time you met her?She cried when it rained and blamed the weatherBut inside she strained with suicide lettersThe kind of cold you couldn’t warm with a sweater Hardly lasted past December She said she was headed down to defeat That’s the last you’d seen and never had dreamed That the same little Heather – It’s who you saw last weekIn an instant you couldn’t have missed her gleamAs she listened she looked like a distant queen With a difference, there for all to seeShe found a different – A different kind of free”

“I write for fun. I had written a kind of media satire, but I doubt it will see the light of day. It was just a personal project.”

“I certainly wasn't the kind of kid that grew up collecting bugs and spiders.”

“Muhammad adhered meticulously to the charter he forged for Medina, which - grounded as it was in the Quranic injunction, "Let there be no compulsion in religion" (2:256) - is arguably the first mandate for religious tolerance in human history.”

“If you haven't walked in someone else's shoes, it's difficult to know the fit, so be kind and compassionate.”

“When Donald Trump comes after any part of our community, he'll find 419,000 Minneapolitans and me standing squarely in his way. That's the kind of wall I can support.”

“(...)"Take your time, because thereisn’t a moment to spare,(...) That’s what Stein told me when I had to leave Menakfor the first time. It kind of means that wherever yourdestination is, now is the time to start working towards it,or you will never get there.”

“We must be able to love other people or forever endure the stain of disgraceful loneliness. By recognizing and expressing empathy for other people, we come to accept our own fallibility.”

“When I watch good friends play, it's almost worse when you're watching, because you have zero impact: you have zero hand in what's going on. When I'm playing, you don't have that because I'm involved in it. I have some kind of say in what's going on.”

“I have an independent streak. You know, it's kind of hard to tell a independent woman what to do.”

“Usually, the music inspires the lyrics. The lyrics just sort of fall off like a bunch of crumbs from the melody. That's all I want them to be - crumbs. I don't want to work any kind of fabricated message.”