Top 100 Michael Franti Sayings
#1. You say you're a Christian, cause God made you, you say you're a Muslim cause God made you, you say you're a Hindu and the next man a Jew, but then we all kill each other cause God told us to? Naw!
Michael Franti
#3. Bonnaroo has kind of become the granddaddy of all American festivals. The thing I love about it most is that it wasn't born out of picking the top ten bands off the Billboard chart and creating a festival around it.
Michael Franti
#4. My mother birthed three children and she adopted myself and another African-American son. My adoptive parents were Finnish. I grew up in a white picket neighborhood.
Michael Franti
#5. I believe that in order to tackle the big issues of the world today, like environmental issues, we need everybody's involvement. We need the resources of the corporate world. We need the cooperation of governments. We need the wisdom of indigenous people.
Michael Franti
#6. I always identified with that feeling of being an underdog. So I always was looking to connect with and meet people from other cultures, to experience people living a different life that I am.
Michael Franti
#7. One of the things I love about yoga is that it brings you into the present moment. You aren't worried about what will happen tomorrow and you aren't thinking about what happened yesterday. It's about opening your heart and living from your heart.
Michael Franti
#8. The more places I go to, the more I realize I understand so little about the world.
Michael Franti
#9. You get everything you could have ever wished for if you're willing to give that eternal bliss away to somebody else, to give it back.
Michael Franti
#10. The personal revolution is far more difficult, and is the first step in any revolution.
Michael Franti
#11. People ask me a lot, 'what can one person do,' and I say 'I'm not really sure what one person can due except come together with other people.
Michael Franti
#12. You learn a lot when you're barefoot. The first thing is every step you take is different.
Michael Franti
#14. When you're in Jamaica, unless you're in a tourist spot, you don't hear Bob Marley; you mostly hear dance hall music.
Michael Franti
#15. It shouldn't be a Republican or Democratic issue whether we take care of the environment. That should be a human issue.
Michael Franti
#16. People underestimate the hip-hop audience and the capacity to understand politics when it's part of music.
Michael Franti
#18. Not all artists have a responsibility to be socially or politically aware, but they do have a responsibility to make great art. They have to find some truth and put that in their music.
Michael Franti
#19. To sit back and say, 'Oh, we're going to let the government do whatever they want, right or wrong,' is giving up.
Michael Franti
#20. The way the music comes to you starts to affect how you listen to music. When you're a kid, it's 'Does it rock? Does it make me feel good? Does it make me tap my feet? Does it make me go to sleep?'
Michael Franti
#21. It was hard for me, as a father, to imagine going through what my birth mom went through, to raise a child inside of her for nine months, and then have to say goodbye. And so it's hard for me to understand that pain and that process.
Michael Franti
#22. History shows that Americans believe in doing the right thing.
Michael Franti
#23. You can bomb the world to pieces, but you can't bomb it into peace. Power to the peaceful.
Michael Franti
#25. When we all see justice, then we'll all see peace!
Michael Franti
#26. I always know when a song is good or close to finished. When I sing it, it makes me feel the emotion. My tears will start flowing or I'll start laughing. I'll start feeling whatever intensity or emotion was the seed of that song.
Michael Franti
#27. People worry that gas prices are high and how they are affecting their pocket book. But they want to know about renewable energy. People are really starting to question things, and that's made people look to the future in a positive way.
Michael Franti
#28. I think my soul is intact, but my methods of reaching people are completely different.
Michael Franti
#29. I went to the University of San Francisco on an athletic scholarship. I didn't study in high school. I was just there to get by and to play basketball. But a funny thing happened to me when I got to college. I got challenged by the work and the professors.
Michael Franti
#30. The world can't have a global solution to climate change with U.S. action alone; and the world can't have a global solution without U.S. action.
Michael Franti
#33. A lot of times we look at the whole world and think, 'it's so daunting, how can we change the whole world?' and you don't need to do that, what you need to do is change your world a little bit, and see if you can, through example, inspire others to do the same thing.
Michael Franti
#34. It ain't about who ya love, it's all about do ya love.
Michael Franti
#35. I'm always trying to find optimistic ways to express myself.
Michael Franti
#36. The corporate media is there to push the agenda of the sponsors, and many of those sponsors are weapons manufacturers. So it stands to reason that you won't get a diversity of opinions on television.
Michael Franti
#37. I really believe that, as an artist, my opportunity to help to bring about awakening is one that should come from a personal process that someone has, and not from me telling somebody that this is the way it is.
Michael Franti
#38. I think of love as an action. Finding something that's outside of yourself, to serve someone else's soul, helping to ignite someone else's spirit, to bring about ease of heart and joy, serenity in somebody else.
Michael Franti
#39. Whenever people go out of their way to help other people - there's power and beauty in our diversity.
Michael Franti
#40. My mother, she made sure all of us were treated the same and had the same opportunity to grow and develop, so that when we left the house, we could fly on our own. And she also knew when we got out into the world, we'd treat others that we came across with that same treatment and respect.
Michael Franti
#41. I took a trip in 2004, a year after the war started in Iraq. I played music on the streets of Baghdad for Iraqi civilians. I'd also play for U.S. soldiers at night when they were off duty in the bars. Then I would talk to people, and I would film them and ask them about their life and the conflict.
Michael Franti
#42. I have a passion to make a difference in the world. And that difference can be just making the fans at my show leave with a smile on their faces and feeling uplifted.
Michael Franti
#43. Those who start wars never fight them, and those who fight wars never like them.
Michael Franti
#44. My goal has not ever been to change minds, my goal is to open minds.
Michael Franti
#45. Jamaica's a country of great dichotomy. On the one hand you have a tourist industry with great beaches and resorts, but on the other you have such great poverty and the violence that goes along with that.
Michael Franti
#46. In the '80s, Ronald Reagan inspired me to become politicized, because I grew up in that era when everything I cared about was under attack.
Michael Franti
#47. With all the people hating and hurting each other, I don't understand how people could get upset about people of the same sex caring for each other.
Michael Franti
#48. It doesn't matter if you're black, white, gay, straight, come from different countries, different language ... every single person is significant and is meaningful.
Michael Franti
#49. Having personal things in balance is more important than the other.
Michael Franti
#50. I'd play music on the street, especially in developing nations where a lot of kids couldn't wear shoes. In order to relate with kids that would be following me barefoot, I would take off my shoes, and they would all laugh at me because I couldn't go three steps without wincing.
Michael Franti
#51. My parents said sticks and stones will break your bones but names will never hurt you. But I always felt a sense of exhilaration after a fight; it was the names that really hurt me.
Michael Franti
#52. After a show, I'll get the 16-year-old white kid whose lip is pierced, his head is shaved and his parents hate him, and the young gangster from the screwed-up 'hood, and they say that now they realize there's someone out there who thinks like they do.
Michael Franti
#53. When someone can't afford to wear shoes, it's not just about them not having shoes on that day. It's about a cycle of poverty that exists within their community.
Michael Franti
#55. Every bit of land is a Holy land, and every drop of water is Holy water, and every single child is a son or a daughter of the one Earth mama, and the one Earth papa.
Michael Franti
#56. Music is also one of the great heart openers. Sometimes, you hear the lyrics of a song and you dance, laugh, smile, or perhaps even cry.
Michael Franti
#57. My mother and father took me in and provided everything for me - the love, nurturing, basic necessities - to give me the space to grow wings, so that when I went out into the world, I could fly.
Michael Franti
#59. When I first started out, I thought it was enough to make an angry song that pointed out the problems of the world.
Michael Franti
#60. I believe that through positive thoughts, speech, action and attitudes, we change things for the better.
Michael Franti
#61. Like sunshine, music is a powerful force that can instantly and almost chemically change your entire mood.
Michael Franti
#63. Playing on the streets of Iraq, or in Israel or the Gaza strip, I'd sing angry protest songs against war. People would say, 'Make us clap, make us dance, and laugh and sing.' It really made me think about the importance of happy music.
Michael Franti
#64. I'm a news junkie who's constantly reading newspapers and magazines. I look around and see what's happening in the world.
Michael Franti
#65. We don't have to be good, you know? No one's telling us that we have to do good things, but we do them because we know it makes other people feel good and it makes us feel good.
Michael Franti
#66. Music has the power to bring people together like no other art form.
Michael Franti
#67. Music is sunshine. Like sunshine, music is a powerful force that can instantly and almost chemically change your entire mood. Music gives us new energy and a stronger sense of purpose.
Michael Franti
#68. I try to use the attention that I get to help and to serve, and that's really what I'd see as my work - to serve my community, serve the planet, serve my family. And I think a celebrity is someone who draws the attention on themselves, and then it kind of stops there.
Michael Franti
#69. I've always found that the poorer the places that I go, the more smiles I see, and the more happiness I see.
Michael Franti
#71. When many little people in many little places do many little things, then the whole world changes.
Michael Franti
#72. When I first started, my songs were the politics of anger. As I got older and hopefully wiser, I wanted to be part of the politics of answers.
Michael Franti
#73. I was adopted when I was a baby. My mother carried me for nine months and she held me for one hour, and didn't see me again.
Michael Franti
#74. I hope I inspire people to dream bigger than what they are living, but a dream within their reach.
Michael Franti
#75. Many kids in foster homes have a lot of emotions that are hard to get out. It's important to let them know they can make a difference in the community.
Michael Franti
#76. Through music I either tame my demons or unleash them and allow them to be what they are. I don't want the music to be about provocation, I want the music to bring you to a place where you feel at home.
Michael Franti
#77. I went to Iraq because I wanted to see what one year of occupation had done to Iraqi society, and I went to the West Bank and Gaza Strip because I wanted to see what three generations of occupation had done to Palestinian society. I found a lot more hopelessness and despair in Palestine.
Michael Franti
#78. The music industry has been hijacked by corporate interests, but the way music affects people and resonates with them hasn't changed.
Michael Franti
#79. Everybody's opinion is equally valid, and I feel like everybody should have an opportunity to speak out, and everyone should have the courage to speak out.
Michael Franti
#80. The human interest, and the natural interest, and the spiritual interest of this planet need to begin to take a priority over the corporate interest, the military interest, and the materialistic interests.
Michael Franti
#81. Music was a central part of my childhood because my mother played organ and piano in the church, and that meant all us kids had to be in the church choir.
Michael Franti
#82. I think that fear comes about when there's things in the world that we want to change, things we're scared or angry about, and we can't change them, and so we become fearful; we develop anxiety.
Michael Franti
#83. The main thing is to be myself. What I mean by that is, to be honest when called upon to express your feelings. The other thing is - maybe this should come first - to be a good listener. To close your mouth and to listen, and to be able to echo back what your partner says to you.
Michael Franti
#84. Music gets us in touch with our emotions in a way that's more intimate than any other art form.
Michael Franti
#85. It's that transformative nature of love and music and yoga that really inspires me.
Michael Franti
#86. We have a saying in my house, my kids and my girlfriend. We say, 'Be your best for the greater good, and rock out wherever you are.'
Michael Franti
#87. Recording in Jamaica is like nothing else. The studios are always closed in America. But in Jamaica, the studio doors are wide open, and there's music blasting out in the street. You can see the reaction of people immediately.
Michael Franti
#88. Traveling to the Middle East and playing music for people on the street, for soldiers, for people in hospitals, and for people who lost their homes, and seeing people open up through the experience of music really restored my faith in music, in art, and in culture to change things.
Michael Franti
#89. In Jamaica, the music is recorded for the sound system, not the iPod. It's about experiencing music together, with other people.
Michael Franti
#90. All my songs are different, but from the overall experience, I want people to sense that they can overcome and move through difficult times and find strength in my music. Maybe it's a song that makes them cry and move through something else.
Michael Franti
#91. All the freaky people make the beauty of the world.
Michael Franti
#92. We can bomb the world to pieces, but we can't bomb it into peace.
Michael Franti
#93. I came up playing in both punk rock bands and hip-hop bands, and I found a more universal way of reaching people, especially with music that has a message to it.
Michael Franti
#94. We would play songs live on stage, and then we'd watch their reaction we were receiving immediately, if people were dancing and singing along. If they weren't, then we'd go into the dressing rooms of the different NBA teams that we were playing in their arenas, and we'd change the songs right there.
Michael Franti
#95. Don't let mistakes be so monumental, don't let your love be so confidential, don't let your mind be so darn judgemental, and please let your heart be more influential. Be thankful for all that the spirit provides and be thankful for all that you see without eyes.
Michael Franti
#96. If you love the planet or the neighborhood - you're finding ways to satisfy the soul of the planet or satisfy the soul of the neighborhood.
Michael Franti
#98. Life is too short to make just one decision, music is too loud for just one station, love is too big for just one nation, and God is too big for just one religion!
Michael Franti
#99. I don't know if it's so grand that I can change the entire world, but I know that I can help one person. So that's the goal.
Michael Franti
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