I believe that one can never leave home. I believe that one carries the shadows, the dreams, the fears and the dragons of home under one's skin, at the extreme corners of one's eyes and possibly in the gristle of the earlobe.

It is impossible to struggle for civil rights, equal rights for blacks, without including whites. Because equal rights, fair play, justice, are all like the air: we all have it, or none of us has it. That is the truth of it.

My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive

Life loves the liver of it.

The real difficulty is to overcome how you think about yourself. If we don't have that we never grow, we never learn, and sure as hell we should never teach.

I love a statement by the apostle Paul, in the Book of Philippians in the Bible. I think the Corinthians had been writing to Paul, telling him that old men were chasing young women, nobody was tithing - and all that must have run Paul crazy. He wrote back and said, "If there be anything of good report, speak of these things." That's one of my principles.It's another discipline that I encourage myself to employ - to, as much as possible, say the courteous thing, and then be it.

I think a number of the leaders are, whether you like it or not, in the hip-hop generation. And when they understand enough, they'll do wonders. I count on them.