I found power in accepting the truth of who I am. It may not be a truth that others can accept, but I cannot live any other way. How would it be to live a lie every minute of your life.

One must know oneself. If this does not serve to discover truth, it at least serves as a rule of life, and there is nothing better.

Only a fool would blindly believe everything she was told.

You have far more courage than you think you do.

There was a saying that the strength of a man’s steel was only known under the hammer of circumstance. If anyone had asked me a few hours ago, I would have said that nearly five years of boyhood had hammered me into constant fear and excessive caution. But now I realised it had done the opposite. It had shaped me into someone who stepped forwards and reached for what she wanted. It was too late for me to tuck my hands behind my back and wait like a good woman.

There was a saying that a man's true character was revealed in defeat. I thought it was also revealed in victory.