You see, we may encounter many defeats, but we must not be defeated. It may even be necessary to encounter the defeat, so that we can know who we are… - Maya Angelou

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You see, we may encounter many defeats, but we must not be defeated. It may even be necessary to encounter the defeat, so that we can know who we are. So that we can see, oh, that happened, and I rose. I did get knocked down flat in front of the whole world, and I rose. I didn’t run away – I rose right where I’d been knocked down. And then that’s how you get to know yourself. You say, hmm, I can get up! I have enough of life in me to make somebody jealous enough to want to knock me down. I have so much courage in me that I have the effrontery, the incredible gall to stand up. That’s it. That’s how you get to know who you are.

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About Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou (4 April, 1928 – 28 May, 2014), born Marguerite Annie Johnson, was an American poet, author, memoirist, actress, director, producer, writer, singer, dancer, and civil rights activist.

Biography information from Wikiquote

Also Known As

Birth Name: Marguerite Annie Johnson
Alternative Names: Marguerite Johnson Marguerite Ann Johnson Marguerite Anne Johnson
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Additional quotes by Maya Angelou

Be the best of anything you get into. If you want to be a whore, it's your life. Be a damn good one. Don't chippy at anything. Anything worth having is worth working for.'
It was her version of Polonius' speech to Laertes. With that wisdom in my pouch, I was to go out and buy my future.

Momma intended to teach Bailey and me to use the paths of life that she and her generation and all the Negroes gone before had found, and found to be safe ones. She didn't cotton to the idea that whitefolks could be talked to at all without risking one's life. And certainly they couldn't be spoken to insolently. In fact, even in their absence they could not be spoken of too harshly unless we used the sobriquet “They.” If she had been asked and had chosen to answer the question of whether she was cowardly or not, she would have said that she was a realist.

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