Best 433 quotes in «activism quotes» category

Cause-and-effect assumes history marches forward, but history is not an army. It is a crab scuttling sideways, a drip of soft water wearing away stone, an earthquake breaking centuries of tension. Sometimes one person inspires a movement, or her words do decades later, sometimes a few passionate people change the world; sometimes they start a mass movement and millions do; sometimes those millions are stirred by the same outrage or the same ideal, and change comes upon us like a change of weather. All that these transformations have in common is that they begin in the imagination, in hope.

Christ wasn’t only a yogi; he was an activist, carrying his message to those who most needed it.

Could it be that following our initiatory path and connecting with higher source wisdom might actually be one of our species’ best defense systems?

Cypress laid waste to the tunnels, caverns, and shadows of the other world. She drew upon memories of her own blood: her presence would be a mortal threat to those who wounded, maimed, her ancestors, her lovers, Leroy. Like those women before her, who loaded bundles on their heads and marched off to fields that were not their own, like the "bearers" of her dreams swamped with births of infants they would never rear, Cypress clung to her body, the body of a dancer; the chart of her recklessness, her last weapon, her perimeters: blood, muscle, and the will to simply change the world.

Darkness seems to have prevailed and has taken the forefront. This country as in the 'cooperation' of The United States of America has never been about the true higher-good of the people. Know and remember this. Cling to your faith. Roll your spiritual sleeves up and get to work. Use your energy wisely. Transmute all anger, panic and fear into light and empowerment. Don't use what fuels them; all lower-energy. Mourn as you need to. Console who you need to—and then go get into the spiritual and energetic arena. There's plenty work for us to do; within and without. Let's each focus on becoming 'The President of Our Own Life. Cultivate your mind. Pursue your purpose. Shine your light. Elevate past—and reject—any culture of low vibrational energy and ratchetness. Don't take fear, defeat or anger—on or in. The system is doing what they've been created to do. Are you? Am I? Are we—collectively? Let's get to work. No more drifting through life without your higher-self in complete control of your mind. Awaken—fully. Activate—now. Put your frustrations or concerns into your work. Don't lose sight. There is still—a higher plan. Let's ride this 4 year energetic-wave like the spiritual gangsters that we are. This will all be the past soon. Let's get to work and stay dedicated, consistent and diligent. Again, this will all be the past soon. We have preparing and work to do. Toxic energy is so not a game. Toxic energy and low vibrations are being collectively acted out on the world stage. Covertly operating through the unconscious weak spots and blind spots in the human psyche; making people oblivious to their own madness, causing and influencing them to act against–their–own–best–interests and higher-good, as if under a spell and unconsciously possessed. This means that they are actually nourishing the lower vibrational energy with their lifestyle, choices, energy and habits, which is unconsciously giving the lower-energy the very power and fuel it needs—for repeating and recreating endless drama, suffering and destruction, in more and more amplified forms on a national and world stage. So what do we do? We take away its autonomy and power over us while at the same time empowering ourselves. By recognizing how this energetic/spiritual virus or parasite of the mind—operates through our unawareness is the beginning of the cure. Knowledge is power. Applied knowledge is—freedom. Our shared future will be decided primarily by the changes that take place in the psyche of humanity, starting with each of us— vibrationally. In closing and most importantly, the greatest protection against becoming affected or possessed by this lower-energy is to be in touch with our higher vibrational-self. We have to call our energy and power back. Being in touch with our higher-self and true nature acts as a sacred amulet, shielding and protecting us from the attempted effects. We defeat evil not by fighting against it (in which case, by playing its game, we’ve already lost) but by getting in touch with the part of us that is invulnerable to its effects— our higher vibrational-self. Will this defeat and destroy us? Or will it awaken us more and more? Everything depends upon our recognizing what is being revealed to us and our stepping out of the unconscious influence of low vibrational/negative/toxic/evil/distraction energy (or whatever name you relate to it as) that is and has been seeking power over each of our lives energetically and/or spiritually, and step into our wholeness, our personal power, our higher self and vibrate higher and higher daily. Stay woke my friends—let's get to work.

Democracy wasn't a set of dry documents nicely laid out on office stationary - it brimmed in the lips of thousands of souls and debated in dozens of accents as it crossed the street from one neighborhood to the next. It was the smell of stale coffee and bodies packed into an old community center. It was the typos in the fliers. It was exasperation, realization, illumination - a knockdown, drag out, sweaty, tearful, impassioned process of people making decisions together.

Decir estudiante hoy en día no significa na, pero en una América Latina con los ánimos exaltados por la Caída de Arbenz, por el Apedreo de Nixon, por las Guerrillas de la Sierra Maestra, por las cínicas maniobras sin fin de los Yankee Pig Dogs —en una América Latina ya entrada año y medio en la Década de la Guerrilla— ser estudiante era algo, un agente de cambio, una secuencia de quantum vibrante en el universo serio newtoniano.

Direct democracy is lazy anarchy, for people who don't want to be governed but are too lazy to govern themselves. They want participation served to them.

Disinfect the world my friend – disinfect it with your thinking – disinfect it with your actions – disinfect it with your existence.

Each of us lives with a sword over his head. There are those who can ignore its shadow and those who cannot. Those who cannot are not necessarily better than those who can. But they are the creators of the special myth of their time, because any myth is the creation of the very few who cannot bear reality.

Don’t be a witness. Be an activist.

Don’t think it is enough to attend meetings and sit there like a lump…. It is better to address envelopes than to attend foolish meetings. It is better to study than act too quickly; but it is best to be ready to act intelligently when the appropriate opportunity arises… Speak up. Learn to talk clearly and forcefully in public. Speak simply and not too long at a time, without over-emotion, always from sound preparation and knowledge. Be a nuisance where it counts, but don’t be a bore at any time… Do your part to inform and stimulate the public to join your action…. Be depressed, discouraged and disappointed at failure and the disheartening effects of ignorance, greed, corruption and bad politics — but never give up.

Do what you can, when you can.

Dr. King's policy was that nonviolence would achieve the gains for black people in the United States. His major assumption was that if you are nonviolent, if you suffer, your opponent will see your suffering and will be moved to change his heart. That's very good. He only made one fallacious assumption: In order for nonviolence to work, your opponent must have a conscience. The United States has none.

During the Vietnam War, every respectable artist in this country was against the war. It was like a laser beam. We were all aimed in the same direction. The power of this weapon turns out to be that of a custard pie dropped from a stepladder six feet high.

Every human had the seed of rebellion hardwired into their heart. Squeeze the shell of conformity hard enough and it cracks, allowing the spirit of resistance to burst forth.

emergence notices the way small actions and connections create complex systems, patterns that become ecosystems and societies. Emergence is our inheritance as a part of this universe; it is how we change. Emergent strategy is how we intentionally change in ways that grow our capacity to embody the just and liberated worlds we long for.

Emergent strategy is a way that all of us can begin to see the world in life-code—awakening us to the sacred systems of life all around us.

Every crisis, actual or impending, needs to be viewed as an opportunity to bring about profound changes in our society. Going beyond protest organizing, visionary organizing begins by creating images and stories of the future that help us imagine and create alternatives to the existing system.

Emergence emphasizes critical connections over critical mass, building authentic relationships, listening with all the senses of the body and the mind.

Extract and expel implicit biases from your work life. Don't taint our visitors with your bias and views. Allow them to form their own conclusions where it's developmentally appropriate.

Everything's urgent to a Democrat.

Finding ways to appreciate advances without embracing complacency is a delicate task. It involves being hopeful and motivated and keeping eyes on the prize ahead. Saying that everything is fine or that it will never get any better are ways of going nowhere or of making it impossible to go anywhere. Either approach implies that there is no road out or that, if there is, you don’t need to or can’t go down it. You can. We have.

Feeling anger is necessary; it’s what we do with anger that will make or break us.

Flo especially took me in hand. When I felt I had to prove the existence of discrimination with statistics, for instance, she pulled me aside. 'If you're lying in the ditch with a truck on your ankle,' she said patiently, 'you don't send someone to the library to find out how much the truck weighs. You get it off!

For all of the pedestals MLK is now put on, far above the reach of ordinary black Americans, Martin was in his life viewed as the most dangerous man in America.

For a man who makes his salvation perfect through suffering, is more of a saint and a loving hero of nature.

For twenty years I have sat alone at a desk tinkering with sentences and then sending them out, and for most of my literary life the difference between throwing something in the trash and publishing it was imperceptible...

For the love of one person, we can find the strength to love the whole world.

‎God remains silent so that men and women may speak, protest, and struggle. God remains silent so that people may really become people. When God is silent and men and women cry, God cries in solidarity with them but doesn't intervene. God waits for the shouts of protest.

Fundamentally, what all forms of positive thinking about collapse come down to is our own fear of death.

From the comfort of our own homes its hard to understand the complexities of something like poverty and homelessness.

From this perspective, we were all divine Shakespeares, creating and playing the roles of muscled heroes and conniving villains, pious saints and debauched sinners, corrupt CEOs and disinterested temp workers.

Gender is just one of many systems of oppression. The ultimate goal is to see how all systems are tied in a knot with the others and untie, unravel the knots of oppression. It's a spiritual journey more than a governmental one. It's about asking ourselves, 'Is this culture stopping me or anyone else from the free expression of sex and gender?' and if so, we have to act.

Gradualism veiled as hope is all too often a balm to the privileged and a poison to the oppressed.

Governance to me is action not an organization. It is something people have to just do. It is only after governance by the people is established that politicians can be lobbied into supporting it until it makes them obsolete.

Gratitude is a state of mind that inherently recognizes interdependence with the external world, whether it be other humans, nature, the sacred, or a combination of these.

Having an open mind means learning too add more to our already existing beliefs about affirming dignity of those who are impoverished.

How do you photograph injustice? It is the easiest to photograph, for it is as common as the number of people on the earth; each person staggers under its weight.

He could take on anything and everything, it seemed, rather than leave himself time to reflect on his dissatisfaction with his life and what he might do about it.

Here, poverty in the United States is a choice. Stagnant middle-class incomes are a choice. Technology-fueled mass unemployment is a choice. Racism is a choice. The patriarchy is a choice. This is not to discount how deeply entrenched existing policies, interests, and tendencies are - but to recognize that while they might be entrenched, they are not immutable.

Home was within.
 Home was without.
 Home was here and now. 
Home was everything that already was and always is. There were so many chases and trips, and directions and events and places and experiments, and relationships all searching and never finding.
It wasn't anything I ever expected. It wasn't anywhere I expected it. Or with who. It didn't come into being by me doing anything. It simply existed within my heart space, when I could look at and be with and face my fear, knowing it was only an illusion to keep me from seeing the truth.
The truth of myself. In love. 
Eyes wide open.
 Home.

Horizontal governance does not mean no one gets a voice, it means everyone does. A person or group who attempts to suppress the voices of others is attempting to seize control.

How do the day’s event(s) compare with the famous quote you’ve picked to write about in So This Just Happened: The Journal for USA Current Events? Journal your thoughts on current events inside, in light of the 101 famous and thought-provoking quotes about the United States of America, democracy and more. Abnormal times call for first person accounts: witness current events compared to the United States of America’s values, laws, and principles. So This Just Happened: The Journal for USA Current Events includes 101 thought-provoking and insightful quotes by Founding Fathers’, famous historical figures, past Presidents and more for you to compare and contrast with current events. With a quote on every other lined journal page; you can write in order or flip to the most relevant quote for the day’s events to write about. Each lined page for you to write on has a spot to write the date at the top.

How many little kids were being orphaned or killed, right that minute, while I was sitting there watching TV?

History has seen many who claim to be deliverer and saviour of the people. They might come with force and violence and parade their might and splendour as conquerors. The pharaohs of Egypt, Sennacherib king of Assyria, Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, Darius of Persia, Alexander the Great, Hannibal, Napoleon, Clive of India, Bismarck, the Kaiser, Hitler, Stalin. The story and scene is always the same. They claim to deliver the people from bondage and to establish justice, freedom and peace. They come in might, riding in splendour, dragging prisoners.

Home is where you feel safe, a place with people you can count on and where you can be yourself

Hopefulness is risky, since it is after all a form of trust, trust in the unknown and the possible, even in discontinuity. To be hopeful is to take on a different persona, one that risks disappointment, betrayal...

Hope is not a door, but a sense that there might be a door at some point, some way out of the problems of the present moment even before that way is found or followed.

How can you not be involved? These are your times, your world, even if those events are on the other side of it. And as for the narrative--you are a part of that, for better or for worse, whether the grey inexorable economic inevitabilities--recessions and recoveries and having less money or more--or the grand perilous global story.