“I was taught to strive not because there were any guarantees of success but because the act of striving is in itself the only way to keep faith with life.”

“I have spent a lifetime looking for remedies to all manner of life's problems -- personal, social, political, global. I am deeply suspicious of those who offer simple solutions and statements of absolute certainty or who claim full possession of the truth. Yet I have grown equally skeptical of those who suggest that all is too nuanced and complex for us to learn any lessons, that there are so many sides to every thing that we can pursue knowledge every day of our lives and still know nothing for sure. I believe we can recognize truth when we see it, just not a first and not without ever relenting in our efforts to learn more. This is because the goal we seek, and the good we hope for, comes not as some final reward but as the hidden companion to our quest. It is not what we find, but the reason we cannot stop looking and striving, that tells us why we are here.”

“The main thing is to remain oneself, under any circumstances; that was and is our common purpose.”

“I do not believe that things happen accidentally; I believe you earn them.”

“I also think it is important for women to help one another. I have a saying: There is a special place in hell for women who don't.”

“There is a special place in hell for women who don't help other women."(Keynote speech at Celebrating Inspiration luncheon with the WNBA's All-Decade Team, 2006)”

“There is a significant moral difference between a person who commits a violent crime and a person who tries to cross a border illegally in order to put food on the family table. Such migrants may violate our laws against illicit entry, but if that's all they do they are trespassers, not criminals. They deserve to have their dignity respected.”