Write down the thoughts of the moment. Those that come unsought for are commonly the most valuable.

Everything that is done in the world is done by hope.

The concept of loneliness and exile and self-sufficiency continually bucks me up.

As long as you live, keep learning how to live.

Knowledge is a polite word for dead but not buried imagination.

Sporadic thoughts will pop into my head and I’ll have to go write something down, and the next thing you know I’ve written a whole song in an hour.

Strong emotions such as passion and bliss are indications that you’re connected to Spirit, or ‚inspired,‘ if you will. When you’re inspired, you activate dormant forces, and the abundance you seek in any form comes streaming into your life.

Getting a great idea with song writing is a lot like love. You don’t know why this one is different, but it is. You don’t know why this one is better, but it is. It sticks in your head, and you can’t stop thinking about it.

At the touch of love everyone becomes a poet.

There is spontaneity to my work.

Find a beautiful piece of art. If you fall in love with Van Gogh or Matisse or John Oliver Killens, or if you fall love with the music of Coltrane, the music of Aretha Franklin, or the music of Chopin – find some beautiful art and admire it, and realize that that was created by human beings just like you, no more human, no less.

You practice mindfulness, on the one hand, to be calm and peaceful. On the other hand, as you practice mindfulness and live a life of peace, you inspire hope for a future of peace.

I learned from the guys before me – Bill Cosby, Eddie Murphy, Chris Rock, Richard Pryor, just to name a few. These are guys that let it all hang out. What they lived is what they took to the stage.

Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me.

I’ve done many ads because that’s my new career. It’s an inspiring extension for my mind.

I never woke up and thought, ‚I really want to live a bold life.‘

I’d rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach 10,000 stars how not to dance.

We must act out passion before we can feel it.

Man is only great when he acts from passion.

I think there is a sense of being forced at this time to look at America’s really large shadow and that’s not all that bad.

It is a great piece of folly to attempt to make anything out of my early life.

An artist has no home in Europe except in Paris.

Eating words has never given me indigestion.

Old friends pass away, new friends appear. It is just like the days. An old day passes, a new day arrives. The important thing is to make it meaningful: a meaningful friend – or a meaningful day.

I’m a songwriter. Everything affects me.

I believe in pink. I believe that laughing is the best calorie burner. I believe in kissing, kissing a lot. I believe in being strong when everything seems to be going wrong. I believe that happy girls are the prettiest girls. I believe that tomorrow is another day and I believe in miracles.

Time stays, we go.

O love, if I regret the age when one savors you, it is not for the hour of pleasure, but for the one that follows it.

And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair.

Sometimes I catch myself stooping, and whenever I am like that, I am sure something is not quite right.

Every great person is always being helped by everybody; for their gift is to get good out of all things and all persons.

Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.

Thank God, I never was cheerful. I come from the happy stock of the Mathers, who, as you remember, passed sweet mornings reflecting on the goodness of God and the damnation of infants.

Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.

In everyone’s life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit.

The future is called ‚perhaps‘, which is the only possible thing to call the future. And the important thing is not to allow that to scare you.

Waste brings woe, and sorrow hates despair.

Man’s only true happiness is to live in hope of something to be won by him. Reverence something to be worshipped by him, and love something to be cherished by him, forever.

Youth is a blunder; Manhood a struggle, Old Age a regret.

Free people, remember this maxim: we may acquire liberty, but it is never recovered if it is once lost.

Any artist, the work you do, if it’s a painting or if it’s a performance, you hope it translates to a common denominator with the people that they see something in their own life in there. Or they see something in somebody else’s life. That’s what’s fun about sharing art.

Eloquence is a painting of the thoughts.

At ev’ry word a reputation dies.

Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.

There’s no present. There’s only the immediate future and the recent past.

If you really want to know what Middle-earth is based on, it’s my wonder and delight in the earth as it is, particularly the natural earth.

To all those who have suffered as a consequence of our troubled past I extend my sincere thoughts and deep sympathy. With the benefit of historical hindsight we can all see things which we would wish had been done differently or not at all.

I know the blessing of having a dad who played 16 years in the league. That experience, and seeing him as an example, let me know that it’s possible. It’s not easy, but it’s possible.

Now I realize that from ’72 through to about ’76, I was the ultimate rock star. I couldn’t have been more rock star.

Every man is a quotation from all his ancestors.

I hope my story inspires everyone out there to keep hustling and chasing their dreams.

Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.

Experience is the child of thought, and thought is the child of action.

Sometimes I just sit still and enjoy God’s presence.

Men shrink less from offending one who inspires love than one who inspires fear.

Through my films I’m eventually trying to one day tell the truth. I don’t know if I’m ever going to get there, but I’m slowly letting pieces of myself out there and then maybe by the time I’m 85, I’ll look back and say, ‚All right, that about sums it up.‘

There are dark shadows on the earth, but its lights are stronger in the contrast.

I have to write because if I don’t get something down then after a while I feel it’s going to bang the side of my head off.

One thing that writers have in common is that they are readers first. They have read lots and lots of stuff, because they’re just infested with lots of stuff.

On the outskirts of every agony sits some observant fellow who points.

Millions of people were inspired by the Apollo Program. I was five years old when I watched Apollo 11 unfold on television, and without any doubt it was a big contributor to my passions for science, engineering, and exploration.