Every person who has ever achieved anything has been knocked down many times. But all of them picked themselves up and kept going, and that is what I have always tried to do.
Wangari MaathaiRead
As I swept the last bit of dust, I made a covenant with myself: I will accept. Whatever will be, will be. I have a life to lead. I recalled words a friend had told me, the philosophy of her faith. "Life is a journey and a struggle," she had said. "We cannot control it, but we can make the best of any situation." I was indeed in quite a situation. It was up to me to make the best of it.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote highlights the importance of acceptance and making the best of life's circumstances.
Wangari Maathai reflects on the inevitability of life's challenges and the need to embrace acceptance. She emphasizes that while we cannot control the events that occur, we possess the power to choose our responses and make the best out of any situation. This mindset allows us to lead meaningful lives despite the struggles we face.
Themes
AcceptanceLifeJourneyStrugglePhilosophy
In practice
Example use cases
During a motivational speech about resilience.
More from Wangari Maathai
All quotes →It was easy to persecute me without people feeling ashamed. It was easy to vilify me and project me as a woman who was not following the tradition of a 'good African woman' and as a highly educated elitist who was trying to show innocent African women ways of doing things that were not acceptable to African men.
Wangari MaathaiRead
I know there is pain when sawmills close and people lose jobs, but we have to make a choice. We need water and we need these forests.
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We’re constantly being bombarded by problems that we face and sometimes we can get completely overwhelmed. [But] we should always feel like a hummingbird. I may feel insignificant, but I don’t want to be like the other animals watching the planet go down the drain. I’ll be a hummingbird, I’ll do the best I can.
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As long as there is no trust and confidence that there will be justice and fairness in resource distribution, political positioning will remain more important than service
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It gradually became clear that the Green Belt Movement's work with communities to repair the degraded environment could not be done effectively without participants embracing a set of core spiritual values.
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