“As long as white people put people of color, African Americans and Latinos, in the same dispensable bag, and look at our children of color as insignificant and treat women of color as not as deserving of protection as white women, we will never achieve true equality.”

Young people think Rosa Parks just sat down on a bus and ended segregation, but that wasn’t the case at all.

I wanted the young African-American girls also on the bus to know that they had a right to be there, because they had paid their fare just like the white passengers.

For African-Americans, it’s still going to be – some people say double hard – I’d say four times as hard. Be an opportunist. Take advantage of your resources, because the only way to win is with education, self-esteem, having value in yourself.

A lot has changed since I grew up, but there’s still a long way to go. I don’t think we can move forward with Donald Trump as the president. There’s a disconnect there. We don’t want to regress, we want progress.

That was worse than stealing, you know, talking back to a white person.

When our founding fathers drafted the Constitution and Bill of Rights, black people weren’t even considered human.

A lot of African American women wanted to emulate white women. But I said in my mind, rationally thinking, there is no way you are going to get your hair that straight, especially in the summer.

When I told my mother I was pregnant, I thought she was going to have a heart attack.

I was about four years old the first time I ever saw what happened when you acted up to whites.

There were many African Americans – many, many stories similar to my story.

I lost most of my friends. Their parents had told them to stay away from me, because they said I was crazy, I was an extremist.

The light-skinned girls always thought they were better looking. So did the teachers, too. That meant most of the dark complexion ones didn’t like themselves.

There was segregation everywhere. The churches, buses and schools were all segregated and you couldn’t even go into the same restaurants.

Being dragged off that bus was worth it just to see Barack Obama become president, because so many others gave their lives and didn’t get to see it, and I thank God for letting me see it.

When you’ve been abused daily and you see people humiliated and harassed, you just get tired of it.

New York is a completely different culture to Montgomery, Alabama.

The ultimate reason for setting goals is to entice you to become the person it takes to achieve them.

Everyone can rise above their circumstances and achieve success if they are dedicated to and passionate about what they do.

If it can be dreamed, it can be done.

I am competing with what I am capable of.

I didn’t mind basic training. It taught me that something that seems impossible at the start can be achieved.

If you realize that all things change, there is nothing you will try to hold on to. If you are not afraid of dying, there is nothing you cannot achieve.

We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.

Achievement happens when we pursue and attain what we want.