QuoteProject
I have never felt that the one thing that I am 'known for' is what I am.
Alice Walker
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Alice Walker suggests that one's identity is not defined solely by what they are known for.

In this quote, Alice Walker reflects on the complexity of identity and the notion that personal worth or true self cannot be limited merely to how others perceive us. She implies that being 'known for' something is often superficial and may not truly capture the essence of who we are. This understanding encourages a deeper exploration of one's self beyond societal labels and expectations.

Themes

IdentitySelfPerceptionWorthPhilosophy

In practice

Example use cases

In a motivational speech to inspire young people to find their own identity.

More from Alice Walker

Animals can communicate quite well. And they do. And generally speaking, they are ignored
Alice WalkerRead
June Jordan, who died of cancer in 2002, was a brilliant, fierce, radical, and frequently furious poet. We were friends for thirty years. Not once in that time did she step back from what was transpiring politically and morally in the world. She spoke up, and led her students, whom she adored, to do the same.
Alice WalkerRead
On a spiritual level, it's as though with my sighted eye I see what's before me, and with my unsighted eye I see what's hidden. It's illuminated life more than darkened it.
Alice WalkerRead
I think 'The Color Purple' is so bursting with love, the need for connection, the showing of the need for connection around the globe.
Alice WalkerRead
How long will it take the citizens of the United States, one wonders, to recognize that the house their country bombed in Iraq is the same one they were living in until it was foreclosed?
Alice WalkerRead
One white man on the platform in South Carolina asked us where we were going--we had got off the train to get some fresh air and to dust the grit and dust out of our clothes. When we said Africa he looked offended and tickled too. Niggers going to Africa, he said to his wife. Now I have seen everything.
Alice WalkerRead

Similar quotes

This day is all that is good and fair. It is too dear, with its hopes and invitations, to waste a moment on the yesterdays.
Ralph Waldo EmersonRead
When journalists and politicians speak of a dwindling middle class that's under economic assault and a poor community that's getting bigger, they're talking about Ferguson. Independent of the racial demographics and dynamics of Ferguson, Missouri, there's a 'Ferguson' near you.
Jesse JacksonRead
There must be some kind of way out of here,' said the joker to the thief.
Bob DylanRead
...and thus it will go on, so long as children are gay and innocent and heartless.
James M. BarrieRead
I don't have to see a murder in order to condemn murder.
Billy GrahamRead
It's not crime that makes us more punitive in the United States. It's the way we respond to crime and how we view those people who have been labeled criminals.
Michelle AlexanderRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.