Quotes About Empowerment

If I didn't mould my reality then I'd still be in the ghetto where people like me are supposed to stay. You have to dream your way out of the nightmare.

It was a reaction to when I was growing up, and women were supposed to be all blonde hair, gold suntan, and pink lips. It was a real black-and-white opposite of what was considered attractive. I was kicking against something I found really oppressive.

I have learned that you can do anything you want to. They used to ask me if I thought the first lady ought to be paid. If you get paid, then I have to do what first lady is supposed to do. But you can do anything you want to, and it's such a great soap box.

I never felt that I was supposed to be white. Or black, either. My parents just wanted to let me be who I needed to be.

Right now, computers, which are supposed to be our servant, are oppressing us.

When you follow your heart, you're never supposed to do things because of what you think people might say. You do it for the opposite reasons.

You supposed to be able to do anything in this world. That's what Martin Luther King told me.

My future was planned before my birth. I was supposed to get married or be involved in the family business. But I was all about breaking barriers and started thinking out of the box when I was 13-14 years old. Finally, at 17, I floated my own Microfinance Institution (MFI) called Svatantra.

At my aunt's funeral, I promised myself that I wouldn't be bound by the belief that I'm supposed to stay in anything - whether it's a relationship, a job, a house, or a circumstance - if it makes me miserable. She gave me the courage to find my own happiness.

Women feel empowered when they can do the things that are supposed to be only for men, you know? It breaks boundaries, it's liberating, and it's empowering when you feel like, 'Well, I can do that, too.'

Healthy eating isn't supposed to be about self-denial; it's not a punishment.

This is supposed to be a participatory democracy and if we're not in there participating then the people that will manipulate and exploit the system will step in there.

I've never been one to bow down to people who try to question my identity because I don't fit their mould of what an Aboriginal Australian is supposed to be or look like.

The Barefoot College is supposed to be a sparking off process. People are adopting it and owning it, which is really the story behind the college.

As women, we're always supposed to be catty, or too cute to dance. And it sucks.

I think, in history, we often see a false representation of women. The men are always the successors and, supposedly, of their own merit, which I don't believe to be to true.

There is no opposition between efficiency and justice; on the contrary, an institution run by those who actually do the work is likely to be more effective than one run by interchangeable exploiters who often lack any specific expertise in what they are supposedly managing.

It would be futile to attempt to fit women into a masculine pattern of attitudes, skills and abilities and disastrous to force them to suppress their specifically female characteristics and abilities by keeping up the pretense that there are no differences between the sexes.

If I hold back any part of me, I suppress that much energy and potential. The question I want to ask myself now is not what behavior is good or bad, but in what ways would I express myself with greater energy if I didn't hold back.

I think black women feel an obligatory pressure to be stronger than everybody else, not necessarily to suppress the pain.

I don't think a man should try to suppress a woman just because he's married to her.

When we look at countries that suppress women's rights, I think that they are missing the point. Women have so much to offer.

Black people don't have an accurate idea of their history, which has been either suppressed or distorted.

I believe that I understand gangs better than others. Because they're formed out of necessity. They're formed by people to keep from being suppressed.