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There are uses to adversity, and they don’t reveal themselves until tested. Whether it’s serious illness, financial hardship, or the simple constraint of parents who speak limited English, difficulty can tap unexpected strengths.

Sonia Sotomayor

Some people choose not to engage the battle and then don’t seek out that kind of success. And others do.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Battle Choice Engagement Kindness People Seek
We have to look and ensure that we’re paying attention to what we’re doing, so that we don’t reflexively institute processes and procedures that exclude people without thought.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Attention Institution Pay People Procedure Thinking
In every position that I’ve been in, there have been naysayers who don’t believe I’m qualified or who don’t believe I can do the work. And I feel a special responsibility to prove them wrong.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Believe Myself Position Qualification Responsibility Work Wrong
If I write a book where all I’ve ever experienced is success, people won’t take a positive lesson from it. In being candid, I have to own up to my own failures, both in my marriage and in my work environment.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Book Environment Experience Failure Myself People Success Work Writing
Experience has taught me that you cannot value dreams according to the odds of their coming true. Their real value is in stirring within us the will to aspire.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Aspiration Dreams Experience Reality True Value
If the system is broken, my inclination is to fix it rather than to fight it. I have faith in the process of the law, and if it is carried out fairly, I can live with the results, whatever they may be.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Break Carry Fight Live Myself Process Result System
Although I grew up in very modest and challenging circumstances, I consider my life to be immeasurably rich.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Challenge Growth Life Modesty Myself Rich
My judicial philosophy is fidelity to the law.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Judiciary Law Myself Philosophy
There are no bystanders in this life.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Life One Liner Stand
Through reading, I escaped the bad parts of my life in the South Bronx. And, through books, I got to travel the world and the universe. It, to me, was a passport out of my childhood and it remains a way – through the power of words – to change the world.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Bad Book Escape Life Myself Power Reading Travel Universe Word
A surplus of effort could overcome a deficit of confidence.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Confidence Effort
The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to speak openly and candidly on the subject of race, and to apply the Constitution with eyes open to the unfortunate effects of centuries of racial discrimination.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Constitution Discrimination Eyes Race Stop Talk Way
I think that even someone who got into an institution through affirmative action could prove they were qualified by what they accomplished there.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Accomplishment Action Institution Myself Quality Thinking
The truth is that since childhood I had cultivated an existential independence. It came from perceiving the adults around me as unreliable, and without it I felt I wouldn’t have survived. I cared deeply for everyone in my family, but in the end I depended on myself.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Adult Care Children End Existence Interdependence Myself Truth
To me, lawyering is the height of service – and being involved in this profession is a gift.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Gift Law Myself Professional Service
Pretending to be a princess is fun, but it is definitely not a career.
SONIA SOTOMAYOR

Career Fun Pretend

There are uses to adversity, and they don’t reveal themselves until tested. Whether it’s serious illness, financial hardship, or the simple constraint of parents who speak limited English, difficulty can tap unexpected strengths.

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Popular Authors

There are uses to adversity, and they don’t reveal themselves until tested. Whether it’s serious illness, financial hardship, or the simple constraint of parents who speak limited English, difficulty can tap unexpected strengths.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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