I write for the same reason I breathe – because if I didn’t, I would die.

It does not take much strength to do things, but it requires great strength to decide on what to do.

‚They‘ are the people that don’t believe in you, that say that you won’t succeed. We stay away from ‚They.‘

Scientists have to have a metaphor. All scientists start with imagination.

Language ought to be the joint creation of poets and manual workers.

Before you start a goal – let’s take care of our insecurities because they are going to surface when you put yourself in the crucible and you’re suffering.

I know you’ve heard it a thousand times before. But it’s true – hard work pays off. If you want to be good, you have to practice, practice, practice. If you don’t love something, then don’t do it.

Practice yourself, for heaven’s sake in little things, and then proceed to greater.

I’d be so bored if I wasn’t going out there, knowing that I could still do it. So, I’m going to work hard to be ready to go, and I still plan on playing for a long time.

I enjoy acting when you really hit it right.

When the water starts boiling it is foolish to turn off the heat.

See that the imagination of nature is far, far greater than the imagination of man.

Red is such an interesting color to correlate with emotion, because it’s on both ends of the spectrum. On one end you have happiness, falling in love, infatuation with someone, passion, all that. On the other end, you’ve got obsession, jealousy, danger, fear, anger and frustration.

Only a man who knows what it is like to be defeated can reach down to the bottom of his soul and come up with the extra ounce of power it takes to win when the match is even.

Nearly all the things I do that are of any merit at all start off just being good fun, and I think I’m sort of building up to doing something else quite soon.

Her body calculated to a millimeter to suggest a bud yet guarantee a flower.

How many a man has thrown up his hands at a time when a little more effort, a little more patience would have achieved success.

Most rock journalism is people who can’t write, interviewing people who can’t talk, for people who can’t read.

I don’t do Shakespeare. I don’t talk in that kind of broken English.

Courage – you develop courage by doing small things like just as if you wouldn’t want to pick up a 100-pound weight without preparing yourself.

I don’t know anything that builds the will to win better than competitive sports.

When I do have free time, I spend it with friends, or I spend it at home writing or making something.

Self-confidence is the first requisite to great undertakings.

Most of those melodies are me trying to find out what notes fit, and then hitting ones that don’t fit in a very interesting way.

I don’t think the ebbs and flows – get in great shape and then get out of shape and then see if you can get back into shape – is a good thing. So I prefer to keep my arm always ready to go.

Poetry is a deal of joy and pain and wonder, with a dash of the dictionary.

Even when you’re 50, you can make the effort to improve your standards.

Somebody once asked me what my theory of life was, and I said, ‚Don’t try.‘ That fits the writing, too. I don’t try; I just type.

There are no rules of architecture for a castle in the clouds.

It’s not the load that breaks you down, it’s the way you carry it.

In order to carry a positive action we must develop here a positive vision.

Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions.

I have an obsession with knowing the answers to things. When I don’t know what happened, it just bothers me, gets under my skin, and I need to write about it.

Innovation can only occur where you can breathe free.

I think people should feel encouraged to be themselves.

I have only one counsel for you – be master.

Rule number one is: Beat your team-mate.

The finest clothing made is a person’s own skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this.

When you are organizing a group of people, the first thing that we do is we talk about the history of what other people have been able to accomplish – people that look like them, workers like them, ordinary people, working people – and we give them the list: these are people like yourself; this is what they were able to do in their community.

He who has courage and faith will never perish in misery!

I love wisdom. And you can never be great at anything unless you love it. Not be in love with it, but love the thing, admire the thing. And it seems that if you love the thing, and you don’t just want to possess it, it will find you.

I didn’t have any agenda or plan when I started writing stuff.

If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else.

The worst thing one can do is not to try, to be aware of what one wants and not give in to it, to spend years in silent hurt wondering if something could have materialized – never knowing.

Better to fight for something than live for nothing.

I don’t know how much longer I’ll be around. I’ll probably be writing when the Lord says, ‚Maya, Maya Angelou, it’s time.‘

You must capture and keep the heart of the original and supremely able man before his brain can do its best.

As I read more and more – and it was not all verse, by any means – my love for the real life of words increased until I knew that I must live with them and in them, always. I knew, in fact, that I must be a writer of words, and nothing else.

We should live our lives as though Christ were coming this afternoon.

The very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.

O, you men who think or say that I am malevolent, stubborn or misanthropic, how greatly do you wrong me. You do not know the secret cause which makes me seem that way to you, and I would have ended my life – it was only my art that held me back. Ah, it seemed impossible to leave the world until I had brought forth all that I felt was within me.

I’ve never been able to witness the birth of an idea. It seems as if one second, there’s nothing particularly going on, and the next second, something is there. It’s coming up out of my unconscious, up from places that I don’t even know where they are.

Never be ashamed! There’s some who’ll hold it against you, but they’re not worth bothering with.

Must is a hard nut to crack, but it has a sweet kernel.

A bad book is as much of a labor to write as a good one, it comes as sincerely from the author’s soul.

It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.

For a long time now I have tried simply to write the best I can. Sometimes I have good luck and write better than I can.

God wants to use you to make other people happy! And the happier you make others, the happier you will be because you reap what you sow.

When I write a book, I write a book for myself; the reaction is up to the reader. It’s not my business whether people like or dislike it.

We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated.

The ladder of success is never crowded at the top.