I want everybody to understand that I am an American Negro first before I am a member of any political party.

True self is non-self, the awareness that the self is made only of non-self elements. There’s no separation between self and other, and everything is interconnected.

We’re one of the only animals in the world that don’t really think of ourselves as animals, but we are animals, and we must respect our fellow animals.

Become aware of your own insufficiency.

If you’re embarrassed because you have some notion about how men are supposed to behave, and it doesn’t include weeping, then you have some personal work to do.

It doesn’t take much to make me angry.

I don’t care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members.

I know who I am, I know what I can and can’t do. I know what I will and won’t do. I know what I’m capable of and I don’t agree to do things that I don’t think I can pull off.

Could the young but realize how soon they will become mere walking bundles of habits, they would give more heed to their conduct while in the plastic state.

One must marry one’s feelings to one’s beliefs and ideas. That is probably the only way to achieve a measure of harmony in one’s life.

The only way to avoid being miserable is not to have enough leisure to wonder whether you are happy or not.

The true artist is not proud: he unfortunately sees that art has no limits; he feels darkly how far he is from the goal, and though he may be admired by others, he is sad not to have reached that point to which his better genius only appears as a distant, guiding sun.

No change of circumstances can repair a defect of character.

You use a glass mirror to see your face; you use works of art to see your soul.

What a terrible thing to have lost one’s mind. Or not to have a mind at all. How true that is.

In the stillness of your presence, you can feel your own formless and timeless reality as the unmanifested life that animates your physical form. You can then feel the same life deep within every other human and every other creature. You look beyond the veil of form and separation. This is the realization of oneness. This is love.

Why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me.

Avoid popularity if you would have peace.

When I grew up, the Devil was a reason why I had a headache or the Devil was the reason I got mad today. We always blamed the Devil. I think today when I say the Enemy, I like to make it broader. Sometimes the Enemy can be our own thoughts.

I don’t like to read things that people write about me. I’d rather read what kids have to say about me because it’s not their profession to do that.

A man’s own judgment should be the final appeal in all that relates to himself.

Why does your mind conform? Have you ever asked? Are you aware that you are conforming to a pattern? It doesn’t matter what that pattern is, whether you have established a pattern for yourself or it has been established for you.

A man is never more truthful than when he acknowledges himself a liar.

True knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing.

It is important to remember yourself.

There is nothing so terrible as activity without insight.

Few are those who see with their own eyes and feel with their own hearts.

I feel like you get more bees with honey. But that doesn’t mean I don’t get frustrated in my life. My way of dealing with frustration is to shut down and to think and speak logically.

Every spoken word arouses our self-will.

What is this world that is hastening me toward I know not what, viewing me with contempt?

First, I’m trying to prove to myself that I’m a person. Then maybe I’ll convince myself that I’m an actress.

We are just an advanced breed of monkeys on a minor planet of a very average star. But we can understand the Universe. That makes us something very special.

Unlike some politicians, I can admit to a mistake.

Perhaps it is better to be irresponsible and right, than to be responsible and wrong.

Sadly, the truth is, there aren’t many people who can be put in high positions who won’t start thinking highly of themselves.

I think it’s important as an artist to never forget where you’re from.

A man can’t be too careful in the choice of his enemies.

I am whatever you say I am; if I wasn’t, then why would you say I am.

Nothing is more difficult, and therefore more precious, than to be able to decide.

I need one of those baby monitors from my subconscious to my consciousness so I can know what the hell I’m really thinking about.

Hide our ignorance as we will, an evening of wine soon reveals it.

Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight.

I think I am smart unless I am really, really in love, and then I am ridiculously stupid.

If anything is certain, it is that I myself am not a Marxist.

Mastery passes often for egotism.

The paradox of education is precisely this – that as one begins to become conscious one begins to examine the society in which he is being educated.

What I think is fair to say is that, coming out of the Republican camp, there have been efforts to suggest that perhaps I’m not who I say I am when it comes to my faith – something which I find deeply offensive, and that has been going on for a pretty long time.

I exaggerate when I’m angry, but I’ve never gone around telling people things that aren’t true about me.

Nobody can hurt me without my permission.

When making your choice in life, do not neglect to live.

Food is everything we are. It’s an extension of nationalist feeling, ethnic feeling, your personal history, your province, your region, your tribe, your grandma. It’s inseparable from those from the get-go.

The real power of the Buddha was that he had so much love. He saw people trapped in their notions of small separate self, feeling guilty or proud of that self, and he offered revolutionary teachings that resounded like a lion’s roar, like a great rising tide, helping people to wake up and break free from the prison of ignorance.

The proper study of Man is anything but Man; and the most improper job of any man, even saints (who at any rate were at least unwilling to take it on), is bossing other men. Not one in a million is fit for it, and least of all those who seek the opportunity.

Somebody’s boring me. I think it’s me.

I’ve been called a moron since I was about four. My father called me a moron. My grandfather said I was a moron. And a lot of times when I’m driving, I hear I’m a moron. I like being a moron.

A fanatic is a man who consciously over compensates a secret doubt.

People like to blame others. I think a person should just look at their own situation, look around them, find out what they wish to do, and seek and go and do that. And that’s it.

Who you are speaks so loudly I can’t hear what you’re saying.

Everybody always laughs because I feel so much more comfortable with, like, a giant paper bag on my whole body and paint on my face. Sometimes I try really hard to take it all off. But inevitably what’s underneath is still not a straight edge. And I don’t think it ever will be.

Individuals need to be willing to face truth about their attitudes, behaviors, even what we want out of life.

Most of one’s life is one prolonged effort to prevent oneself thinking.