Kerry Washington Quotes

I have a deep, deep love for sneakers.

Learn to embrace your own unique beauty, celebrate your unique gifts with confidence. Your imperfections are actually a gift.

Today there are people trying take away rights that our mothers, grandmothers and great-grandmothers fought for: our right to vote, our right to choose, affordable quality education, equal pay, access to health care. We the people can't let that happen.

I think most people, when they think about the Black Panther Party, they think in very abstract, caricatured terms. They think about black fists in the air, but they don't think about the actual people, and the families, and the relationships.

I'm here not just as an actress but as a woman, an African-American, a granddaughter of Ellis Island immigrants, a person who could not have afforded college without the help of student loans and as one of millions of volunteers working to re-elect President Obama!

I don't think I'm even close to fulfilling my potential.

And I think also that, unlike a pianist or a flutist, an actor has an instrument that is constantly changing.

I'll be honest with you. I'm a little bit of a loner. It's been a big part of my maturing process to learn to allow people to support me. I tend to be very self-reliant and private. And I have this history of wanting to work things out on my own and protect people from what's going on with me.

We need to be willing to be uncomfortable, to be flawed, to be imperfect, to own our voice, to step into our light, so that we can continue to inspire other people and employ other people, and make room for more and more voices and presence.

I wouldn't just come home from school and watch TV everyday, they had me involved in lots of local theatre. I was a very dramatic, talkative child. And that was part of my mother's creative solution - to put me in workshops and classes and children's theatre programmes.

Because having your story told as a woman, as a person of color, as a lesbian, as a trans person, or as any member of any disenfranchised community, is sadly often still a radical idea. There is so much power in storytelling, and there is enormous power in inclusive storytelling, in inclusive representations.

The breakdown of the black community, in order to maintain slavery, began with the breakdown of the black family. Men and women were not legally allowed to get married because you couldn't have that kind of love. It might get in the way of the economics of slavery. Your children could be taken from you and literally sold down the river.

I have to do the work of self-love and affirmation, and say, "I am a woman, I am a person of color, I am the granddaughter of immigrants, I am also the descendant of slaves, I am a mother, I am an entrepreneur, I am an artist, and I'm joyful." And maybe in seeing my joy, you can finish your sentence with, "And I am joyful too."

To meet somebody who's able to harness the level of courage it takes to walk away and to choose your own life and your own health, the well-being of your family, is really inspiring.

There are so many untold stories when it comes to great women of color.

I was really lucky because I went to an all-girl school and that single sex education really helped me because I really learned to bond with women and to not compete with or compare myself as much because we were all allowed to be ourselves and be unique and kind of have our unique strengths.

You can be the lead in your own life.

I've been doing this work [ambassador of VDay]for a long time, and there are so many ways that we have to work to eradicate domestic violence and violence against women, this felt like such a tangible way to make a difference.

I think sometimes in life we want to ignore the problems of society and just think about the good. I believe in positive thinking and affirmative living, I also think it's really important to remember all of our disenfranchised members of society.

I think everything in life happens for a reason.

I always think there's room for me to improve as a person.

When somebody shows up at your job and jeopardizes your job, yelling and screaming, that's financial abuse. It threatens your ability to take care of yourself.

I am co-writing a screenplay now and I'm working on the rights to another story I want to do. So I plan to produce and direct. So, for me, I don't really feel that I am vulnerable to that sad baggage that comes with the business of filmmaking.

I work very physically as an actor. The biggest thing for me has been the challenge of how to be this person [Olivia Pope] with the personal transformation that's going on for me physically... That hasn't been easy. It's been an awesome challenge for me...because so much of how I access character is through my body.

I think all of us in our lives feel like we can't make a difference or we can't make a change or it's too late or we're too tired or we're too scared.

The No. 1 reason women stay in abusive relationships - because they're not able to take care of themselves financially. It's also the No. 1 reason why women go back.

Look, I get it. Whether it's school, work, family, we've all got a lot on our minds. People say to me, "I'm just too busy to think about politics." But here's the thing: You may not be thinking about politics, but politics is thinking about you.

My brain and my heart are really important to me.

I don't know why I wouldn't seek help to have those things be as healthy as my teeth. I go to the dentist. So why wouldn't I go to a shrink?

Whenever I talk to survivors [of a domestic abuse relationship] who have lived through that and are on the other side and their whole perspective on life is a complete 180, I'm just so inspired.

From what I've been told, the scariest part of being part of a domestic abuse relationship is the idea that you cannot escape and you cannot get help, that feeling of being stuck.

As a young girl, my real dream was to be the woman in the shows at SeaWorld.

For me, 40 feels like a beginning. I'm in the middle of so much new - with this career, the kids, and I'm still sort of a newlywed. I'm excited to be at this stage in life.

I get through the tough times through prayer and meditation.

And I have really good friends and family, and a great therapist.

Sometimes it's hard for me to tell the difference between independent filmmaking and studio filmmaking because all the studios have these little independent satellites. It's interesting.

Arts education must be part of our education solution because it works for all students.

I think my first big heartbreak made me more compassionate about other people's heartaches. It enabled me to feel more for others when they are in moments of pain.

If I ever have a family one day, everything else will pale in importance to that.

Voting for [Donald] Trump Is Voting Against Ourselves.

I'm doing this play right now, the new David Mamet play.

It's called 'Race,' and it's very interesting how people really leave the theater filled with the desire to talk about the play and the issues and the characters, and how they're all navigating their personal views around race.

My deepest desire is to create a world where there's room for all of us, where no matter who you are, you get to wake up in the morning and know that you are worthwhile and deserving. If that's the world I want to live in, I have to do the work to make that true for me.

I think that the best day will be when we no longer talk about being gay or straight - it's not a 'gay wedding,' it's just a 'wedding'... It's not a 'gay marriage,' it's just 'a marriage.' It's not a 'black man' or 'white woman,' it's just 'a man' and 'a woman,' or 'a human' and 'a human.' I'd just like to get to that.

I just want to keep having the courage to raise the bar for myself, and to keep striving for excellence in artistic integrity and public service. And to continue to challenge myself to move outside of my comfort zone, personally and professionally.

Sometimes, when we're feeling challenged in life, we feel a pull to isolate, and for me part of the joy of being a wife, a mother, and in a cast of friends is allowing myself to be in spaces of love. So being open to that love.

I'd figure out ways to use role-playing in the healing of people.

We can't say that we believe in each other's fundamental humanity, and then turn a blind eye to the reality of each other's existence, and the truth of each others' hearts. We must be allies and we must be allies in this business, because to be represented is to be humanized, and as long as anyone anywhere is being made to feel less human, our very definition of humanity is at stake, and we are all vulnerable.

I didn't grow up thinking I was pretty; there was always a prettier girl than me. So I learned to be smart and tried to be funny and develop the inside of me, because I felt like that's what I had.

You can never control how people respond to your work. You can only control your own work ethic.

I just want [my daughter Isabelle] to know that she's heard. Really heard, because I feel like that is what we all really want. When I think about any of the missteps in my life that I've made, all of which I'm grateful for, it's because I just so wanted to be truly seen and heard for who I am and was afraid I wasn't or wouldn't be. I see you, I hear you, I'm with you as you are.

It's exciting to me that people know that I'm someone who's very political.

Black community, I think as a whole America is dealing with the issue of homophobia. We got to be really honest about whether we believe in civil rights for all people or not. As Black people we need to remember the moment that we say it's okay to disenfranchise one segment of society, we're opening the door to move backward on ourselves.

It is important to have friends and family around that I love and trust and who love and trust me.