I always like to look on the optimistic side of life, but I am realistic enough to know that life is a complex matter.

I think that a man should not live beyond the age when he begins to deteriorate, when the flame that lighted the brightest moment of his life has weakened.

There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will.

I think the foundation of everything in my life is wonder.

For beautiful eyes, look for the good in others; for beautiful lips, speak only words of kindness; and for poise, walk with the knowledge that you are never alone.

What I have is a malevolent curiosity. That’s what drives my need to write and what probably leads me to look at things a little askew. I do tend to take a different perspective from most people.

I think the idea of art kills creativity.

He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has.

You cannot let where you are today cause you to get stuck. I’m going to be my best right now. That’s what faith is all about.

Boredom is just the reverse side of fascination: both depend on being outside rather than inside a situation, and one leads to the other.

Start your diet during a period of optimism and happiness.

Life must be lived and curiosity kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.

When things are going bad, don’t get all bummed out. Don’t get startled; don’t get frustrated. If you can say the word ‚good,‘ guess what? It means you’re still alive. It means you’re still breathing.

All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors. Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex and vital.

I think that we all know what evil is. We have a sense of what’s evil, and certainly killing innocent people is evil. We’re less sure about what is good. There’s sort of good, good enough, could be better – but absolute good is a little harder to define.

There can be no better grounding for a lifetime as an author than to see humanity in all its various guises through the lens of the reporter for the town.

I hate quotations. Tell me what you know.

Some people regard private enterprise as a predatory tiger to be shot. Others look on it as a cow they can milk. Not enough people see it as a healthy horse, pulling a sturdy wagon.

The man who has done his level best… is a success, even though the world may write him down a failure.

Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.

Mars is the only place in the solar system where it’s possible for life to become multi-planetarian.

Our character is not so much the product of race and heredity as of those circumstances by which nature forms our habits, by which we are nurtured and live.

The paradox of courage is that a man must be a little careless of his life even in order to keep it.

My favorite thing in life is writing about life, specifically the parts of life concerning love. Because, as far as I’m concerned, love is absolutely everything.

The art of living well and the art of dying well are one.

You can’t be happy by doing something groovy.

I am looking for a lot of men who have an infinite capacity to not know what can’t be done.

As pessimistic as I am about the nature of human beings and our capacity for atrocity and malevolence and betrayal and laziness and inertia, and all those things, I think we can transcend all that and set things straight.

The farmer has to be an optimist or he wouldn’t still be a farmer.

Europe has what we do not have yet, a sense of the mysterious and inexorable limits of life, a sense, in a word, of tragedy. And we have what they sorely need: a sense of life’s possibilities.

No idea is so outlandish that it should not be considered with a searching but at the same time a steady eye.

I have a hard time figuring out what kind of box to put me in, too, because I don’t know exactly what’s going on around me or why. But I need to stay outside of boxes because then I can look at what’s inside of them without being part of them.

When I was 18, I thought that, to be a romantic, you couldn’t live past 30.

It isn’t what you have, or who you are, or where you are, or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about.

To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness.

We are such stuff as dreams are made on; and our little life is rounded with a sleep.

Life is too short to be little. Man is never so manly as when he feels deeply, acts boldly, and expresses himself with frankness and with fervor.

Life is tragic. You are tiny and flawed and ignorant and weak, and everything else is huge, complex, and overwhelming.

Life’s a rollercoaster. You’re up one minute; you’re down one minute. But who doesn’t like rollercoasters?

There is no such thing on earth as an uninteresting subject; the only thing that can exist is an uninterested person.

These are not dark days: these are great days – the greatest days our country has ever lived.

Take care to sell your horse before he dies. The art of life is passing losses on.

Pick the day. Enjoy it – to the hilt. The day as it comes. People as they come… The past, I think, has helped me appreciate the present – and I don’t want to spoil any of it by fretting about the future.

In all my work, in the movies I write, the lyrics, the poetry, the prose, the essays, I am saying that we may encounter many defeats – maybe it’s imperative that we encounter the defeats – but we are much stronger than we appear to be and maybe much better than we allow ourselves to be. Human beings are more alike than unalike.

Pretension is a poor joke that you play on yourself. Snap out of it. Recognise your strengths, work on your weaknesses. Real achievement is liking what you see in the mirror every morning.

All meanings, we know, depend on the key of interpretation.

Whoever is happy will make others happy too.

When you have kids, you see life through different eyes. You feel love more deeply and are maybe a little more compassionate. It’s inevitable that that would make its way into your songwriting.

Human life is everywhere a state in which much is to be endured, and little to be enjoyed.

The talent for being happy is appreciating and liking what you have, instead of what you don’t have.

God is a thought who makes crooked all that is straight.

Almost everybody is born a genius and buried an idiot.

Never elated when someone’s oppressed, never dejected when another one’s blessed.

Nothing is enough for the man to whom enough is too little.

Frankly, I mean, sometimes the interpretations I’ve seen on some of the songs that I’ve written are a lot more interesting than the input that I put in.

I love people who make me laugh. I honestly think it’s the thing I like most, to laugh. It cures a multitude of ills. It’s probably the most important thing in a person.

The choicest pleasures of life lie within the ring of moderation.

The sun is gone, but I have a light.

I believe everyone should have a broad picture of how the universe operates and our place in it. It is a basic human desire. And it also puts our worries in perspective.

The key to immortality is first living a life worth remembering.

If there is a transmigration of souls then I am not yet on the bottom rung. My life is a hesitation before birth.