Liz Goldwyn Quotes

There's so much more to people than their differences.

Six billion of us walking the planet, six billion smaller worlds on the bigger one. Shoe salesmen and short-order cooks who look boring from the outside - some have weirder lives than you. Six billion stories, every one an epic, full of tragedy and triumph, good and evil, despair and hope. You and me - we aren't so special, bro.

For me, I think it's such an important thing to hear other people's stories, because you do find ways that either you can learn something from them, or you can identify with something that they've gone through. You realize that maybe what you're going through in life isn't just specific to you, that somebody else understands it, or you talk to someone and all of sudden you see something in a completely different way because of what they've said to you or shared with you.

There is always someone in the world who is better or worse off than yourself, and I've never seen that - in either direction - as a barrier to becoming friends with somebody.

I tell stories about people audiences might think they have nothing in common with, then they emotionally connect with them and find they're not different at all.

At the end of the day, stories connect us, not politics. And there's so many stories out there waiting to be told. It's just a matter of who's out there listening.

Stories are the common ground that allow people to connect, despite all our defences and all our differences.

I think, really, that the only way a person can open their heart to someone who is so much another is really by knowing them... whether that's in a classroom, or a soccer team, or a food pantry, or any of those things. I mean, we're kind of more alike than we are different.

I don't see anybody as either ordinary or extraordinary. I see them simply as people in front of my lens.

There are so many people in the world with so many different perspectives. But ultimately, at the heart of it, they're people.

I love meeting new people; I think everyone has a story to tell. We should all listen sometimes.

You say to yourself: 'What could people, in all these countries, find in my books?' and yet I think we're all the same, anywhere. Everybody is a hero or a dramatic person in their own story if you just know where to look.

I love human beings. I believe that there is so much to learn from every person you meet, including a child.

Depending on the story that you're telling, you can be relatable to everybody or nobody. I try and tell everybody's story.

I've learnt that the world over, everyone's essentially the same. We are all trying to have a nice time and get along with things.

In fact, some reviewers have said that as they got into the story they forgot that the protagonist is a black woman. They were moved by the story - by the people as a whole - and not by the little things.

Nobody is so weird others can't identify with them.

Each individual is unique. We all have equal worth. Young and old, those who can cope and those who need help.

It's the differences in people that help you realize who you are. Even if we silently pass each other on the street.

We are all human and I want to relate that message to all people.

When you can listen to others' perspectives, we can learn about the other people that make up this great country.

The way people look at me these days - that's the same way I looked at President Obama before I met him. We tend to forget that people who've attained a certain position are human.

We're so complex; we're mysteries to ourselves; we're difficult to each other. And then storytelling reminds us we're all the same.

When you label somebody and put them in a box, then you put the lid on the box, and you just never look inside again. I think it's much more interesting for human beings to look at each other's stories and see each other. Really see each other and then see themselves through other people's stories. That's where you start to break down stereotypes.

Art makes you see people as individual, unique human beings. Art, in that way, allows us to see each other in particulate, as opposed to in aggregate.