I have always been regretting that I was not as wise as the day I was born.

Remember you are just an extra in everyone else’s play.

When granted many years of life, growing old in age is natural, but growing old with grace is a choice. Growing older with grace is possible for all who will set their hearts and minds on the Giver of grace, the Lord Jesus Christ.

We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.

Every time you think the problem is ‚out there,‘ that very thought is the problem.

Nothing on ‚Relapse‘ and very little on ‚Recovery‘ was produced by me.

The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends.

If I am no longer disturbed myself, I will deal less with disturbed people, but I don’t regret having concerned myself with them because I think most of us are disturbed.

The figure a poem makes. It begins in delight and ends in wisdom… in a clarification of life – not necessarily a great clarification, such as sects and cults are founded on, but in a momentary stay against confusion.

If you wish to succeed in life, make perseverance your bosom friend, experience your wise counselor, caution your elder brother, and hope your guardian genius.

Start with what is right rather than what is acceptable.

But Satan now is wiser than of yore, and tempts by making rich, not making poor.

I’m totally myself.

Not what I have, but what I do is my kingdom.

I’ve watched a lot of people who became famous who completely change and I think it’s because they tend to believe all the hype that’s out there. I don’t think there’s that much hype about me.

Don’t feel sorry for me.

I try to teach my heart not to want things it can’t have.

Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.

I put my flaws on front street. So the world accepted my flaws, so I don’t have any flaws.

Thomas Jefferson once said, ‚We should never judge a president by his age, only by his works.‘ And ever since he told me that, I stopped worrying.

Don’t ever forget two things I’m going to tell you. One, don’t believe everything that’s written about you. Two, don’t pick up too many checks.

Many people, especially young people, would like to be more independent and on their own. But it is very difficult and they suffer from feelings of isolation. I think that is one reason why young readers support my work.

More gold has been mined from the thoughts of men than has been taken from the earth.

Even with my divorce and with everything, I don’t need money.

Chaos is a friend of mine.

I was sure I’d set the world on fire, and it was hard for a young feller like me to realize the truth – that I hadn’t set the world on fire, and I was totally unprepared to handle the consequences if ‚The Big Trail‘ had been a success and launched me as a star.

I used to read five psalms every day – that teaches me how to get along with God. Then I read a chapter of Proverbs every day and that teaches me how to get along with my fellow man.

You have to be smart. The easy days are over.

It is a grand mistake to think of being great without goodness and I pronounce it as certain that there was never a truly great man that was not at the same time truly virtuous.

We cannot live being obsessed with what other people think about us. It’s impossible to live like that. Not even God managed to please the entire world.

Many foxes grow gray but few grow good.

I used to stutter really badly. Everybody thinks it’s funny. And it’s not funny. It’s not.

History will point out some of the things I did wrong and some of the things I did right.

Regarding life, the wisest men of all ages have judged alike: it is worthless.

You don’t have the same mentality as you did five years ago – even one year. People are always changing, and I believe that everyone deserves the space to change and for people to recognize their change.

I think I could go away tomorrow. I’ve already accomplished something. It’s such a selfish business that sometimes I get sick of myself.

When a train goes through a tunnel and it gets dark, you don’t throw away the ticket and jump off. You sit still and trust the engineer.

Wisdom is found only in truth.

Better a little which is well done, than a great deal imperfectly.

Ordinary readers, forgive my paradoxes: one must make them when one reflects; and whatever you may say, I prefer being a man with paradoxes than a man with prejudices.

Avoid having your ego so close to your position that when your position falls, your ego goes with it.

I like criticism. It makes you strong.

It’s easy to forget who you are.

For some reason I did something where I realized I could get a reaction. That was when I broke out of my shell at school, because I really didn’t have any friends or anything like that and I just kind of was going along, and then finally I did this zany thing, and all of a sudden I had tons of friends.

You know how advice is. You only want it if it agrees with what you wanted to do anyway.

Surely wisdom will come as we listen to learn from children, parents, partners, neighbors, Church leaders, and the Lord.

Always be yourself, express yourself, have faith in yourself, do not go out and look for a successful personality and duplicate it.

Step with care and great tact, and remember that Life’s a Great Balancing Act.

The thing I always say to people is this: ‚If you avoid failure, you also avoid success.‘

No man can reveal to you nothing but that which already lies half-asleep in the dawning of your knowledge.

Fear defeats more people than any other one thing in the world.

Every man casts a shadow; not his body only, but his imperfectly mingled spirit. This is his grief. Let him turn which way he will, it falls opposite to the sun; short at noon, long at eve. Did you never see it?

If you want to get laid, go to college. If you want an education, go to the library.

He who seeks does not find, but he who does not seek will be found.

O wretched man, wretched not just because of what you are, but also because you do not know how wretched you are!

How prone to doubt, how cautious are the wise!

I’m crazy, but I’m not too crazy.

Love is the wisdom of the fool and the folly of the wise.

Everything you need you already have. You are complete right now, you are a whole, total person, not an apprentice person on the way to someplace else. Your completeness must be understood by you and experienced in your thoughts as your own personal reality.

I have never been able to renounce the light, the pleasure of being, and the freedom in which I grew up.

When you know a thing, to hold that you know it, and when you do not know a thing, to allow that you do not know it – this is knowledge.