Don't face the day until you've faced God.

I want all my senses engaged. Let me absorb the world's variety and uniqueness.

If you have only one smile in you, give it to the people you love. Don't be surly at home, then go out in the street and start grinning 'Good morning' at total strangers.

All people in the world - who are not hermits or mutes - speak words. They speak different languages, but they speak words. They say, "How are you" or "I'm not feeling well" all over the world. These common words - these common elements that we have between us - the writer has to take some verbs and nouns and pronouns and adjectives and adverbs and arrange them in a way that sound fresh.

I write because I am a Black woman, listening attentively to her people.

I don't know how much longer I'll be around. I'll probably be writing when the Lord says, 'Maya, Maya Angelou, it's time.'

The question is not how to survive, but how to thrive with passion, compassion, humor and style.