Keep recognizing that reality is changing and that your ideas have to change. Don’t get stuck in old ideas.
Interpretation
Adaptability is crucial as circumstances evolve; clinging to old ideas can hinder growth.
This quote emphasizes the importance of recognizing that reality is not static but constantly evolving. Grace Lee Boggs advocates for the necessity of adapting our thoughts and ideas to align with the changing world, warning against the dangers of being trapped in outdated beliefs, which can prevent personal and societal progress.
In practice
Use this quote when discussing innovation in a business meeting.
We urgently need to bring to our communities the limitless capacity to love, serve, and create for and with each other. We urgently need to bring the neighbor back into our hoods, not only in our inner cities but also in our suburbs, our gated communities, on Main Street and Wall Street, and on Ivy League campuses.
People are aware that they cannot continue in the same old way but are immobilized because they cannot imagine an alternative. We need a vision that recognizes that we are at one of the great turning points in human history when the survival of our planet and the restoration of our humanity require a great sea change in our ecological, economic, political, and spiritual values.
We urgently need a paradigm shift in our concept of the purposes and practices of education. We need to leave behind the concept of education as a passport to more money and higher status in the future and replace it with a concept of education as an ongoing process that enlists the tremendous energies and creativity of schoolchildren in rebuilding and respiriting our communities and our cities now, in the present.
How do we redefine education so that 30-50 percent of inner-city children do not drop out of school, thus ensuring that millions will end up in prison?
You cannot change any society unless you take responsibility for it, unless you see yourself as belonging to it and responsible for changing it.
The struggle we're dealing with these days, which, I think, is part of what the 60s represented, is how do we define our humanity?
You think that social media is about hooking up online? For these kids [in the Tunisian Revolution], it was a military tool to defend unarmed people from murderers.
Nothing that you plan is going to work out. Everything is going to be totally different than the way you expected. And things will constantly challenge you. Wherever you look the world is not as solid it seems to be.
The city of New Orleans showed America what it takes to rebuild a great place. We're all going together, and we're not leaving anybody behind.
So watch me strike a match on all my wasted time. As far as I'm concerned you're just another picture to burn.
You can change all things for the better when you change yourself for the better.
Racial discrimination, South Africa's economic power, its oppression and exploitation of all the black peoples, are part and parcel of the same thing.
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