Everything is an open book. I don’t speak on other people’s hardship, but if it happened in my life or something that has been an experience on my particular journey, I’m going to talk about it. That’s what my fan base appreciates the most. I’m universal. You can relate to the things I say or that I go through.

Like a pianist runs her fingers over the keys, I’ll search my mind for what to say. Now, the poem may want you to write it. And then sometimes you see a situation and think, ‚I’d like to write about that.‘ Those are two different ways of being approached by a poem, or approaching a poem.

Conflict cannot survive without your participation.

I don’t mind telling a dark side.

Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.

People disparage knowing and the intellectual life, and urge doing. I am content with knowing, if only I could know.

Our ambition should be to rule ourselves, the true kingdom for each one of us; and true progress is to know more, and be more, and to do more.

It’s very unnatural to be someone for so many people. But of course it’s very nice.

In a real dark night of the soul, it is always three o’clock in the morning, day after day.

Do the thing you fear most and the death of fear is certain.

Narrow your life down to this moment. Your life situation may be full of problems – most life situations are – but find out if you have a problem at this moment. Do you have a problem now?

You will find as you grow older that courage is the rarest of all qualities to be found in public life.

Hard times arouse an instinctive desire for authenticity.

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

I resigned from the Marine Corps and flying in 1974, even though I loved them both. I quit because I no longer wanted to fight for peace. Instead, I believe we can build a more sustainable peace by working for prosperity.

The best of us must sometimes eat our words.

Speak the truth, and all things alive or brute are vouchers, and the very roots of the grass underground there, do seem to stir and move to bear you witness.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep.

The true identity theft is not financial. It’s not in cyberspace. It’s spiritual. It’s been taken.

Experience does not err. Only your judgments err by expecting from her what is not in her power.

We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think. When the mind is pure, joy follows like a shadow that never leaves.

An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.

I do have tatoos, and I do wear leather, but there are other sides of me, that my film express.

I’m sticking to the script, I’m putting that organic feeling back in the game.

Your most important work is always ahead of you, never behind you.

It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.

There are phases in life which surface at times, and it makes you understand that despite you working hard, everything what you are doing is probably not enough. That’s when you need to look around, and beyond.

Don’t get older just to get wiser. If you get older, you will be wiser, I believe that – if you dare. But get older because it’s fun!

The people of Northern Ireland have sorted out my whole life.

Listening to and understanding our inner sufferings will resolve most of the problems we encounter.

I only act from my heart.

We all know we have a finite period of time. I just feel if I’m going to be alive, I want to be challenged – to be as immortal as possible. The path to that isn’t an easy way, but it’s a rewarding way.

The day you stop doing the small things is the day you think you’re above everybody else.

To be able to look back upon ones life in satisfaction, is to live twice.

I learn poetry, learn text, and that really keeps you alive.

I don’t want to be something that just comes and goes.

I am criticised for not celebrating my goals enough. I am very happy from within, very calm. I just don’t celebrate. I celebrate inside.

I intend to inspire people with my story: motivate young people that grew up like myself, or even not like myself. Just, you know, go through the human experience.

Do you want to know who you are? Don’t ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.

I’m not intelligent. I’m not arrogant. I’m just like the people who read my books. I used to have a jazz club, and I made the cocktails and I made the sandwiches. I didn’t want to become a writer – it just happened.

If every choice you make comes from an honest place, you’re solid, and nothing anybody can say about you can rock you or change your opinion.

Live truth instead of professing it.

Buy the ticket, take the ride.

No work or love will flourish out of guilt, fear, or hollowness of heart, just as no valid plans for the future can be made by those who have no capacity for living now.

Nurture your minds with great thoughts. To believe in the heroic makes heroes.

The greatest gift is a portion of thyself.

I always was that person who was hard on myself and challenged myself no matter what I was doing, whether it was passing third grade or playing basketball.

My life is my argument.

I think my worst problem is actually living in the moment and understanding everything that’s going on. I feel like I’m in my own bubble.

I mean we all need a second chance sometimes.

Singing aloud leaves you with a sense of levity and contentedness.

When you are young you tend to do so many things that are not needed. When you get experience, you know what exactly what works for you and you tend to do things that you want.

I like to take every day just searching my own heart, making sure that I’m on course, and I’m doing what God wants me to do. I’m real good with not looking to the critics and looking straight ahead.

Whether I’m wearing lots of makeup or no makeup, I’m always the same person inside.

But by reading them again and again finally I was able to grasp the essential part. What emotion, enthusiasm, enlightenment and confidence they communicated to me! I wept for joy.

You can have the platinum album. But, you know, when you still feel like you haven’t quite found your place in the world, it kind of gives a crazy offset.

A great secret of success is to go through life as a man who never gets used up.

There is more to sex appeal than just measurements. I don’t need a bedroom to prove my womanliness. I can convey just as much sex appeal, picking apples off a tree or standing in the rain.

I think that I’m perfect.

I don’t have much positive to say about motor neuron disease, but it taught me not to pity myself because others were worse off, and to get on with what I still could do. I’m happier now than before I developed the condition.

This is not a showman’s job. I will not step out of character.