Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere.

I’m always trying. Between every book, I think, ‚Well now, it’s time to get down to the serious stuff.‘

Yes, and I can sit down on a white piece of paper and work because I don’t believe too much into inspiration, only I’m waiting for inspiration, work and then inspiration may come. It’s a little too easy to say that.

Many of my fans often tell me that they listen to my songs to get through things. And therefore, obviously, I hope that they can picture being in a place where things are better… I hope my songs can bring people to a calm place.

I’m one of the most adaptable guys I know in as much as travelling is my favourite thing to do in life. With every place I go, I try to stay there long enough to do it justice, long enough so that I can at least imagine what it would be like to live there. Once I imagine that, then it’s OK for me to return home.

I can never say ‚why‘ about anything I do. I suppose I can say ‚how‘ and ‚when‘ and ‚what.‘ But ‚why‘ is impenetrable to me.

I’ve learned over the years that when I go to that place of passion within me, there’s no force in the universe that can interfere with my completing a project.

Look up at the stars and not down at your feet. Try to make sense of what you see, and wonder about what makes the universe exist. Be curious.

If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on.

Never let the fear of striking out get in your way.

There is no failure except in no longer trying.

I treated it like every day was my last day with a basketball.

I didn’t work hard to sit down and not work.

The one way to get me to work my hardest was to doubt me.

You know, not to sound corny or nuthin‘, but I felt like a fighter comin‘ up, man. I felt like, you know, I’m being attacked for this reason or that reason, and I gotta fight my way through this.

If your treat an individual… as if he were what he ought to be and could be, he will become what he ought to be and could be.

The man who goes alone can start today; but he who travels with another must wait till that other is ready.

Every band I’ve worked with also wants to be countercultural in the sense that they want to feel that they’ve gone somewhere that nobody else has been.

Disneyland will never be completed. It will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world.

None of us will ever accomplish anything excellent or commanding except when he listens to this whisper which is heard by him alone.

No man ever achieved worth-while success who did not, at one time or other, find himself with at least one foot hanging well over the brink of failure.

One of the wonderful things about Oprah: She teaches you to keep on stepping.

If you want to talk about something new, you have to make up a new kind of language.

It doesn’t matter who you are – if you dream big and if you work really hard, you can achieve unimaginable results, and that’s really good for the nation.

All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff.

The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible.

Billy Graham is one of my great lifetime heroes. I think he epitomizes the essence of what a Christian leader should be. I have participated in some of his crusades a couple of times in Atlanta. I’ve seen the profound impact he’s had on me personally, and on other people who were not Christians and accepted Christ as Savior.

The future is called ‚perhaps‘, which is the only possible thing to call the future. And the important thing is not to allow that to scare you.

My goal is to entertain myself and others.

How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds makes ill deeds done!

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

Knowledge is a polite word for dead but not buried imagination.

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.

Every morning I jump out of bed and step on a landmine. The landmine is me. After the explosion, I spent the rest of the day putting the pieces together.

Imagination disposes of everything; it creates beauty, justice, and happiness, which are everything in this world.

One of the things you’re doing when you make art, apart from entertaining yourself and other people, is trying to see what ways of working feel good, what feels right.

Fantasy is uni-age. You can start it in the creche, and it follows you to death.

You can’t hire someone to practice for you.

Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.

Get off your butt and join the Marines!

Desire is the very essence of man.

What interests me in life is curiosity, challenges, the good fight with its victories and defeats.

If you always put limit on everything you do, physical or anything else. It will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them.

I’ve always wanted to live above my means because it inspired me to work harder.

Don’t only practice your art, but force your way into its secrets; art deserves that, for it and knowledge can raise man to the Divine.

It’s a representation of yourself, and you can express a lot of your creativity with what your wearing.

Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence.

Do something wonderful, people may imitate it.

The time is always right to do what is right.

I like having my hands in the clay. I like the movie-making process.

Don’t think in the morning. That’s a big mistake that people make. They wake up in the morning and they start thinking. Don’t think. Just execute the plan. The plan is the alarm clock goes off, you get up, you go work out. Get some.

I push myself in a lot of aspects when I write a song. I write a piece and where most people would stop and say, ‚Oh, that’s the hook right there,‘ I’ll move that to the first four bars of the verse and do a new hook.

A musician should only sound like what they do, and no two musicians sound the same. It’s an individual-feel thing, you know?

Every person who wins in any undertaking must be willing to cut all sources of retreat. Only by doing so can one be sure of maintaining that state of mind known as a burning desire to win – essential to success.

Metal, I love metal sounds. If I have a stick with me, I just drag it across a fence. And all fences make different sounds, just like people when they laugh.

Fresh activity is the only means of overcoming adversity.

I am an example of what is possible when girls from the very beginning of their lives are loved and nurtured by people around them. I was surrounded by extraordinary women in my life who taught me about quiet strength and dignity.

To what greater inspiration and counsel can we turn than to the imperishable truth to be found in this treasure house, the Bible?

I couldn’t have written things like ‚Low‘ and ‚Heroes,‘ those particular albums, if it hadn’t have been for Berlin and the kind of atmosphere I felt there.

It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.

Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail.