I even found it difficult to watch myself playing on TV because I couldn’t identify with the person on the screen. I couldn’t get to grips with it. It was as if it was all happening to someone else.

I have the problems of, I must confess, old age.

Many years ago, I concluded that a few hair shirts were part of the mental wardrobe of every man. The president differs from other men in that he has a more extensive wardrobe.

Because my dad abused me, I was determined to never let a man tell me what to do. God clearly showed me that I needed to be a submissive wife if I wanted to be effective in ministry. The truth is, if we don’t learn to submit to authority, we won’t ever learn to submit to God.

To be angry is to revenge the faults of others on ourselves.

We become what we repeatedly do.

Did you know there’s a difference between being busy and being fruitful? Did you ever stop to think that just being busy – running around in circles all day but not accomplishing anything – is the same as wasting your time? It’s frustrating to expend so much energy and time and not have any fruit from your effort!

All men are frauds. The only difference between them is that some admit it. I myself deny it.

Deep down, I know I have this intuition or instinct that a lot of creative people have, that their demons are also what make them create.

It’s true my father abused me and didn’t love and protect me the way he should have, and at times it seemed no one would ever help me and it would never end. But God always had a plan for my life, and He has redeemed me.

Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.

If there are people you haven’t forgiven, you’re not going to really awaken. You have to let go.

I never even thought of myself as deadpan until someone wrote an article about me about a year after I was doing comedy. There was a paper called the ‚Boston Phoenix,‘ and someone wrote a description of what I was doing and that’s where I first saw ‚deadpan.‘

I really haven’t had that exciting of a life. There are a lot of things I wish I would have done, instead of just sitting around and complaining about having a boring life. So I pretty much like to make it up. I’d rather tell a story about somebody else.

The most challenging project I’ve ever done, I think, is every single thing I’ve ever tried to do. It’s never easy.

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.

In my later years, I have looked in the mirror each day and found a happy person staring back. Occasionally I wonder why I can be so happy. The answer is that every day of my life I’ve worked only for myself and for the joy that comes from writing and creating. The image in my mirror is not optimistic, but the result of optimal behavior.

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

Work out your own salvation. Do not depend on others.

I’m no leader; I’m a little humble follower.

I was born with a great gift, and sometimes with that comes a destructive streak.

I believe time wounds all heels.

Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to cast a stone.

It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell.

By the time you’ve reached your sixties, you do know that one day you will die, and knowing that is at least the beginning of wisdom.

Life is not accumulation, it is about contribution.

The wide world is all about you: you can fence yourselves in, but you cannot forever fence it out.

The higher we are placed, the more humbly we should walk.

The problem with me, as far as getting married and having a family, is that my comedy is so important to me. So I don’t know if I’ll ever be as good a dad as my dad.

In so many ways, segregation shaped me, and education liberated me.

You are the universe, you aren’t in the universe.

It is not love that should be depicted as blind, but self-love.

You can’t put your feet on the ground until you’ve touched the sky.

No matter what, people grow. If you chose not to grow, you’re staying in a small box with a small mindset. People who win go outside of that box. It’s very simple when you look at it.

I think who you are in school really sticks with you.

In past generations, people would try to play younger than they really are. My trick is, I don’t try to play younger than I really am.

As the father of eight children, I’m quite convinced that each individual arrives here with their own unique personality. We are intended here from an invisible held of infinite potentiality. That which has no form, has no boundaries – it’s the I that’s in the ever-changing body.

I feel matured in a way that I’m happy about. I’m at this other stage in my life – and it’s not a bad thing at all.

You know, most people really don’t know me.

Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning.

The more in harmony with yourself you are, the more joyful you are and the more faithful you are. Faith is not to disconnect you from reality – it connects you to reality.

Why am I a star? It can’t be because of looks.

You don’t need anybody to tell you who you are or what you are. You are what you are!

Like all dreamers, I mistook disenchantment for truth.

It’s not an easy course. It’s not designed to be. We’re not here to get you in touch with your inner child.

You know, it’s not the world that was my oppressor, because what the world does to you, if the world does it to you long enough and effectively enough, you begin to do to yourself.

There are no limitations to the mind except those we acknowledge.

Before you try to keep up with the Joneses, be sure they’re not trying to keep up with you.

The image is one thing and the human being is another. It’s very hard to live up to an image, put it that way.

When I was writing ‚Kitchen Confidential,‘ I was in my 40s, I had never paid rent on time, I was 10 years behind on my taxes, I had never owned my own furniture or a car.

I have the true feeling of myself only when I am unbearably unhappy.

I am in my own head most of the time.

At the end of the day, I understand that life has road blocks, and life is like school – you’ll be tested; we gotta pass it.

All of us knows, not what is expedient, not what is going to make us popular, not what the policy is, or the company policy – but in truth each of us knows what is the right thing to do. And that’s how I am guided.

Life becomes harder for us when we live for others, but it also becomes richer and happier.

Your love is not outside; it is deep within you. You can never lose it, and it cannot leave you. It is not dependent on some other body, some external form.

We’re all insecure, aren’t we? I’m not walking around like I’m macho man or anything.

It is more difficult to rule yourself than to rule a city.

The closest I ever came to getting married was just before I started singing. In fact, my first record saved my neck.

We have to continue to learn. We have to be open. And we have to be ready to release our knowledge in order to come to a higher understanding of reality.

Let us be absolutely clear about one thing: we must not confuse humility with false modesty or servility.