If one could be friendly with women, what a pleasure – the relationship so secret and private compared with relations with men. Why not write about it truthfully?

The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter – ‚tis the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning.

Talking with a friend is nothing else but thinking aloud.

The Tao teaches us not to intervene and interfere. The things we love we have to learn to leave alone. And the people we love we have to learn to let them be.

Love is about mutual respect, apart from attraction.

No matter how long he lives, no man ever becomes as wise as the average woman of forty-eight.

Intimates are predestined.

Van Gogh never made a penny in his entire lifetime. He painted because it was his soul, his excitement. It was what aligned him with his Source of being. It’s the same with me and writing.

I can’t stress to you enough how much I can relate to teens being cyberbullied. Something that helps me is looking at old videos of me and my friends from middle school, or videos of my family. I love watching funny videos of my favorite people – it really cheers me up.

A friend doesn’t go on a diet because you are fat.

As a matter of self-preservation, a man needs good friends or ardent enemies, for the former instruct him and the latter take him to task.

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

There are three faithful friends – an old wife, an old dog, and ready money.

Absolutely not. I have no problem with commitment. In fact, I love having someone in my life.

Concentration is my motto – first honesty, then industry, then concentration.

The truth is, I often like women. I like their unconventionality. I like their completeness. I like their anonymity.

In writing, I apply my feminine side and respect the mystery involved in creation.

Disagreement is something normal.

Since it is difficult to join them together, it is safer to be feared than to be loved when one of the two must be lacking.

It is more shameful to distrust our friends than to be deceived by them.

There are no rules when it comes to love.

It is a fine thing to be honest, but it is also very important to be right.

I have a personal ambition to live my life honestly and honor the true love that I’ve had and also the people I’ve had around me.

To avoid being mistaken for a sellout, I chose my friends carefully. The more politically active black students. The foreign students. The Chicanos. The Marxist professors and structural feminists and punk-rock performance poets.

I don’t want everybody to see exactly where I live, what my sofa or my fireplace looks like.

Sometimes I’ve called writing a disease. If so, I’m glad that it caught me.

I should like to know what is the proper function of women, if it is not to make reasons for husbands to stay at home, and still stronger reasons for bachelors to go out.

All of the people in my life whom I consider to be close friends or colleagues are good thinkers.

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

I think writing really helps you heal yourself. I think if you write long enough, you will be a healthy person. That is, if you write what you need to write, as opposed to what will make money, or what will make fame.

I’ve always appreciated a turn of phrase.

I kept writing not because I felt I was so good, but because I felt they were so bad, including Shakespeare, all those. The stilted formalism, like chewing cardboard.

It isn’t necessary to have relatives in Kansas City in order to be unhappy.

Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.

Stories surge up out of nowhere, and if they feel compelling, you follow them. You let them unfold inside you and see where they are going to lead.

A true friend encourages us, comforts us, supports us like a big easy chair, offering us a safe refuge from the world.

If you do not tell the truth about yourself you cannot tell it about other people.

I knew I wanted to do something creative. I didn’t think I’d have the luxury of doing something like that, because I didn’t know anyone who had pursued anything they really adored, but I had dreams for singing or writing.

I don’t want enemies. I want friends, and I want them in all shapes, sizes, and colors, and loving whoever they want to.

As to marriage or celibacy, let a man take which course he will, he will be sure to repent.

We’ve got this gift of love, but love is like a precious plant. You can’t just accept it and leave it in the cupboard or just think it’s going to get on by itself. You’ve got to keep watering it. You’ve got to really look after it and nurture it.

I’m not always going to say things the perfect way, the right way. But I’m going to say how I feel.

Reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.

When a person cannot deceive himself the chances are against his being able to deceive other people.

Everybody that I was in school with had an uncle or father in the law, and I started to realize that I was going to end up writing briefs for about ten years for these fellows who I thought I was smarter than. And I was kind of losing my feeling for that.

I would love to get Rihanna on a Khaled song. That’s my friend, but every time I’m around her, I get shy.

I believe in using words, not fists. I believe in my outrage knowing people are living in boxes on the street. I believe in honesty. I believe in a good time. I believe in good food. I believe in sex.

I don’t write with a machine. I write with a pen and a paper, which is what is most comfortable for me.

One can love a child, perhaps, more deeply than one can love another adult, but it is rash to assume that the child feels any love in return.

If you would be loved, love, and be loveable.

I’m not denyin‘ the women are foolish. God Almighty made ‚em to match the men.

You fail only if you stop writing.

It’s annoying, but justice and equality are mates. Aren’t they? Justice always wants to hang out with equality. And equality is a real pain.

‚Some Kind Of Monster‘ is such a nightmare for any musician to watch because you’re watching a band be honest to each other. Not a good idea, man!

Quacks are a part of our culture, and we all fall prey to them. Who among us can say, for sure, that even our own personal physicians are honest and competent?

I don’t write the books. God writes the books and delivers the speeches.

Anger cannot be dishonest.

To be loved is very demoralizing.

I don’t like people looking at someone else’s image.

One is lucky to be born in a place where no one is doing it, because then you can say, ‚Well, obviously I can write better than everyone else in high school.‘ You have no idea of the competition.

I love making new friends and I respect people for a lot of different reasons.