Jemison Quotes & Sayings

She wanted to say, I am made of smoke. My mind is smoke, my thoughts are smoke, I am all smoke and only smoke. This body is a garment I put on, which by my magic art I have made capable of functioning as a human body functions, it's so biologically perfect that it can conceive children and pop them out in threes, fours and fives. Yet I am not of this body and could, if I chose, inhabit another woman, or an antelope, or a gnat. Aristotle was wrong, for I have lived for aeons, and altered by body when I chose, like a garment of which I had grown tired. The mind and the body are two, she wanted to say, but she knew it would disappoint him to be disagreed with, so she held her tongue. — Salman Rushdie

Some people say they feel very small when they think about space. I felt more expansive, very connected to the universe. — Mae Jemison

When God made the color purple, God was just showing off. — Mae Jemison

Without mentioning names, it was other people. Some day, they ought to open the report and find out. But it was other people that knocked down the World Trade Center. So, it's no reason to go into a big - now. But it was a horrible mistake that unfortunately we should never have done it. We have lost trillions of dollars, thousands of lives, wounded warriors, who I love, all over the place. And here is the other part. Iran is taking over Iraq. They have wanted it for decades and decades and decades. They're taking it over. — Donald Trump

I think science fiction helps us think about possibilities, to speculate - it helps us look at our society from a different perspective. It lets us look at our mores, using science as the backdrop, as the game changer. — Mae Jemison

We look at science as something very elite, which only a few people can learn. That's just not true. You just have to start early and give kids a foundation. Kids live up, or down, to expectations. — Mae Jemison

Don't let anyone rob you of your imagination, your creativity, or your curiosity. It's your place in the world; it's your life. Go on and do all you can with it, and make it the life you want to live. — Mae Jemison

I always knew I'd go to space. — Mae Jemison

But the people I admire have always been people like Marlon Brando, Jack Nicholson and Jack Lemmon. — Evan Jones

And I want to work with this Congress, to make sure Americans already burdened with student loans can reduce their monthly payments, so that student debt doesn't derail anyone's dreams. — Barack Obama

Never be limited by other people's limited imaginations. If you adopt their attitudes, then the possibility won't exist because you'll have already shut it out ... You can hear other people's wisdom, but you've got to re-evaluate the world for yourself. — Mae Jemison

I wanted to be a professional dancer for a period of time, and I did a lot of dancing and choreography and got paid for it. — Mae Jemison

I went to school at night in L.A. to brush up on my engineering while I applied to the astronaut program. I really did not know if I would get in. It was the year after the Challenger accident in 1987. — Mae Jemison

The giver gives, but really he is sowing the seed for later, the gift of a rich harvest. — Sathya Sai Baba

A reader of The Unspeakables recently contacted me. She said she had become so engrossed with the paperback she'd taken it to the top of a Munro whilst climbing on the Isle of Mull. I'm delighted to have three-dimensional circulation as well. — Peter F. Jemison

Once I got into space, I was feeling very comfortable in the universe. I felt like I had a right to be anywhere in this universe, that I belonged here as much as any speck of stardust, any comet, any planet — Mae Jemison

People always think of technology as something having silicon in it. But a pencil is technology. Any language is technology. Technology is a tool we use to accomplish a particular task and when one talks about appropriate technology in developing countries, appropriate may mean anything from fire to solar electricity. — Mae Jemison

Never limit yourself because of others' limited imagination; never limit others because of your own limited imagination. — Mae Jemison

What we find is that if you have a goal that is very, very far out, and you approach it in little steps, you start to get there faster. Your mind opens up to the possibilities. — Mae Jemison

All successful revolutions are the kicking in of a rotten door. — John Kenneth Galbraith

You have the right to be involved. You have something important to contribute, and you have to take the risk to contribute it. — Mae Jemison

Some of the most fun people I know are scientists. — Mae Jemison

I stayed in the astronaut program until 1993. People ask me why I left. I thought I had a lot of things to contribute that would be difficult to do if I stayed. I thought I could have a stronger voice as an advocate for space exploration. So I ended up starting my own technology consulting company. — Mae Jemison

Sciences provide an understanding of a universal experience, Arts are a universal understanding of a personal experience ... they are both a part of us and a manifestation of the same thing ... the arts and sciences are avatars of human creativity — Mae Jemison

Sometimes people ask me how difficult the astronaut program was, but being in Sierra Leone, being responsible for the health of more than 200 people, seven days a week, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, at age 26 - that prepared me to take on a lot of different challenges. — Mae Jemison

As an astronaut, you have a very defined set of tasks to do. Those tasks may require you to work 60, 70 or 80 hours a week. — Mae Jemison

The thing that I have done throughout my life is to do the best job that I can and to be me. — Mae Jemison

The future never just happened. It was created. — Mae Jemison

When a man is tired of Ankh-Morpork, he is tired of ankle-deep slurry. — Terry Pratchett

For when two Join in the same adventure, one perceives Before the other how they ought to act; While one alone, however prompt, resolves More tardily and with a weaker will. — Homer

My parents were comfortable with me exploring areas that they were not proficient in. Some parents just aren't comfortable with that. — Mae Jemison

When I'm asked about the relevance to Black people of what I do, I take that as an affront. It presupposes that Black people have never been involved in exploring the heavens, but this is not so. Ancient African empires - Mali, Songhai, Egypt - had scientists, astronomers. The fact is that space and its resources belong to all of us, not to any one group. — Mae Jemison

The fortune which nobody sees makes a person happy and unenvied. — Francis Bacon

I mean Black Flag happened. I was lucky. I don't think I could have put together something with one percent of that oomph on my own. — Henry Rollins

Greatness can be captured in one word: lifestyle. Life is God's gift to you, style is what you make of it. — Mae Jemison

Hanging laundry on a line is a very ordinary task. It is as ordinary as scraped knees and lost keys, as fixing the same simple dish for supper again, and again. Ordinary is most days, and Lord helps is if we overlook them. — Jerusalem Jackson Greer

I think reading a good book makes one modest. When you see the marvelous insight into human nature which a truly great book shows, it is bound to make you feel small
like looking at the Big Dipper on a clear night, or seeing the winter sunrise when you go out to collect the morning eggs. And anything that makes you feel small is mighty good for you. — Christopher Morley

I remember reading about Mae Jemison, that astronaut. That was immensely fantastic to me. This woman went to the moon! — Juliana Rotich

Science provides an understanding of a universal experience. Arts provide a universal understanding of a personal experience. — Mae Jemison

The best answer to all objections urged against prayer is the fact that man cannot help praying; for we may be sure that that which is so spontaneous and ineradicable in human nature has its fitting objects and methods in the arrangements of a boundless Providence. — Edwin Hubbel Chapin