“The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any” has circulated under Alice Walker’s name since a Canadian columnist, Rhona Raskins, printed it as her December 1999 quote of the day — already attributed to Walker, without a source. Quote Investigator never found the line in Walker’s own books, essays, or speeches, but no other author has ever been proposed for it either. By elimination, Walker stays the leading candidate.