If I read a book that impresses me, I have to take myself firmly by the hand, before I mix with other people; otherwise they would think my mind rather queer.

The eye of a human being is a microscope, which makes the world seem bigger than it really is.

When I see myself as an old woman, I just think about being happy. And hopefully, I’ll still be fly.

Every man sees in his relatives, and especially in his cousins, a series of grotesque caricatures of himself.

Books are alive, you see. They’re not dead, they’re alive.

There’s a gap between what I want to do, what I do on camera, and what gets edited. Right? So the goal is to try and close the gaps. What’s the biggest compliment is if I read a review and it’s exactly what I wrote down in my diary before ever filming it. That’s really cool. That’s the biggest signifier of closing the gaps.

Why don’t you start believing that no matter what you have or haven’t done, that your best days are still out in front of you.

There is but an inch of difference between a cushioned chamber and a padded cell.

Reading, solitude, idleness, a soft and sedentary life, intercourse with women and young people, these are perilous paths for a young man, and these lead him constantly into danger.

I think the tiniest little thing can change the course of your day, which can change the course of your year, which can change who you are.

All of my misfortunes come from having thought too well of my fellows.

Win as if you were used to it, lose as if you enjoyed it for a change.

I’m not critic-proof, and I still take it personally, but I take it less personally now.

Whatever deceives men seems to produce a magical enchantment.

I’m giving all that I have in this life. I’m opening up my notebook, and I’m saying everything in there out loud.

Men are disturbed not by things, but by the view which they take of them.

Few men would dare to read their own autobiography if all their deeds were recorded in it; few can look back upon their entire career without a blush.

The battle is all over except the ‚shouting‘ when one knows what is wanted and has made up his mind to get it, whatever the price may be.

He had but one eye, and the popular prejudice runs in favor of two.

You cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you.

It is not fair to ask of others what you are not willing to do yourself.

The willow which bends to the tempest, often escapes better than the oak which resists it; and so in great calamities, it sometimes happens that light and frivolous spirits recover their elasticity and presence of mind sooner than those of a loftier character.

In my divorce, I stood up and said to my ex-wife, ‚Hey, I messed up. This had nothing to do with you. I didn’t understand what marriage was. I cheated. I was wrong. We couldn’t fix it; it got worse. I stepped away because I didn’t want it to get any worse. You’re the mother of my kids – I don’t want to hate you.‘

Sports are basically our way of feeling sorry for ourselves. Most men can’t become athletes. We’re watching guys who actually made it. We see them dunking and making touchdowns. Then we think about ourselves when we were younger.

I am no longer sure of anything. If I satiate my desires, I sin but I deliver myself from them; if I refuse to satisfy them, they infect the whole soul.

I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about dying, but I like to think that I’ve – if it did occur – that I would die peacefully and not make too much of a fuss about it.

Take care to get what you like or you will be forced to like what you get.

Before I can live with other folks I’ve got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s conscience.

O‘ What may man within him hide, though angel on the outward side!

I think I have a dualistic nature.

So many people are looking at what’s wrong, and I try to encourage them to look at what’s right in their life. A lot of people have it a lot worse than you do.

If there is one principle more deeply rooted in the mind of every American, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest.

I just feel that ‚The Color Purple,‘ which was my 10th book, was a true gift from my ancestors.

People tend to play in their comfort zone, so the best things are achieved in a state of surprise, actually.

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.

There is no unique picture of reality.

I sometimes have a tendency to walk on the dark side.

Nature and books belong to the eyes that see them.

The cool thing about reading is that when you read a short story or you read something that takes your mind and expands where your thoughts can go, that’s powerful.

A celebrated people lose dignity upon a closer view.

The book of female logic is blotted all over with tears, and Justice in their courts is forever in a passion.

Everything is changing. People are taking their comedians seriously and the politicians as a joke.

What someone else does or doesn’t do has no effect on me and what I do.

The difference between false memories and true ones is the same as for jewels: it is always the false ones that look the most real, the most brilliant.

A book should serve as the ax for the frozen sea within us.

There is no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather.

The long time to come when I shall not exist has more effect on me than this short present time, which nevertheless seems endless.

The world we see that seems so insane is the result of a belief system that is not working. To perceive the world differently, we must be willing to change our belief system, let the past slip away, expand our sense of now, and dissolve the fear in our minds.

The ancestor of every action is a thought.

Of all the senses, sight must be the most delightful.

You don’t have to give way to careless speech or complaining. You don’t have to let your feelings get in the way of what God wants to do in your life.

The ideas I stand for are not mine. I borrowed them from Socrates. I swiped them from Chesterfield. I stole them from Jesus. And I put them in a book. If you don’t like their rules, whose would you use?

Talk to a man about himself and he will listen for hours.

Don’t just read the easy stuff. You may be entertained by it, but you will never grow from it.

I just wanted to write something about running, but I realized that to write about my running is to write about my writing. It’s a parallel thing in me.

I’ve learned never to say never.

There are as many pillows of illusion as flakes in a snow-storm. We wake from one dream into another dream.

The advice I’ve been giving to people all my life – that you may not be interested in the dialectic but the dialectic is interested in you; you can’t give up politics, it won’t give you up – was the advice I should have been taking myself.

The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.

The longer I am out of office, the more infallible I appear to myself.

With ideas it is like with dizzy heights you climb: At first they cause you discomfort and you are anxious to get down, distrustful of your own powers; but soon the remoteness of the turmoil of life and the inspiring influence of the altitude calm your blood; your step gets firm and sure and you begin to look – for dizzier heights.