For each of us as women, there is a dark place within, where hidden and growing our true spirit rises, beautiful and tough as chestnut stanchions against our nightmare of weakness. Within these deep places, each one of us holds an incredible reserve of creativity and power, of unexamined and unrecorded emotion and feeling
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the inner strength and creativity that women possess, often hidden beneath societal expectations and fears.
Audre Lorde's quote speaks to the profound inner strength and resilience that resides within women. It acknowledges the existence of a 'dark place' that holds both creativity and power, suggesting that despite the weaknesses and societal pressures faced, there lies an untapped reservoir of potential waiting to be recognized and unleashed. This serves as a call for women to confront their inner fears and embrace their true spirit in order to manifest their full capabilities.
In practice
In a women's empowerment seminar to inspire attendees.
The fact that we are here and that I speak these words is an attempt to break that silence and bridge some of those differences between us, for it is not difference which immobilizes us, but silence. And there are so many silences to be broken.
There is no thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives.
There are no new ideas. There are only new ways of making them felt.
I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.
I am deliberate and afraid of nothing.
There's always someone asking you to underline one piece of yourself - whether it's Black, woman, mother, dyke, teacher, etc. - because that's the piece that they need to key in to. They want to dismiss everything else.
In war there is no second prize for the runner-up.
I've still never had a dream that I'm disabled. Never.
Being disabled gave me an immense advantage. People are kinder to you. It puts you on a different level than if you go into a situation whole and secure.
Fear is never a reason for quitting; it is only an excuse.
Refugees don't make our country less safe. But xenophobia, fear and hate do.
Cowardice asks the question, is it safe? Expediency asks the question, is it politic? Vanity asks the question, is it popular? But conscience asks the question, is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because it is right.
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