Yes, there will be challenges, and things will blow up in your face, but learning experiences are different from wasting your life pushing a boulder up a hill.

If you're confident, then you don't feel weird about showing your vulnerability and opening yourself up to learning from somebody else. Insecure people stay where they are because they're afraid of admitting their weaknesses.

See failures as learning experiences, not character faults.

Bravely going out into the world and trying, yet still deep down believing you're ruled by your past circumstances, is like forgiving someone but still hoping they sit in something wet.

You are free to give life meaning, whatever meaning you want to give it.

The truth is, I need to experience my mother's presence in the world around me and not just in my head.

The experience of democracy is like the experience of life itself-always changing, infinite in its variety, sometimes turbulent and all the more valuable for having been tested by adversity.

I always identified with that feeling of being an underdog. So I always was looking to connect with and meet people from other cultures, to experience people living a different life that I am.