I’ve been reckless, but I’m not a rebel without a cause.

I have met 18 million youth, and each wants to be unique.

The most happy man is he who knows how to bring into relation the end and beginning of his life.

I am who I am today because of my mother.

I don’t want followers.

Every now and then I read a poem that does touch something in me, but I never turn to poetry for solace or pleasure in the way that I throw myself into prose.

A man does not know what he is saying until he knows what he is not saying.

I think so many people live their whole life in fear and doubt and shame.

I’m like a recovering perfectionist. For me it’s one day at a time.

I think being able to age gracefully is a very important talent. It is too late for me.

Upon the creatures we have made, we are, ourselves, at last, dependent.

I didn’t want to be a fashion designer, and for a good half of my career I didn’t like it. I always wanted to do other things.

It’s getting harder to make decisions to just want to do something to work… I’m trying to find things that are extremely challenging or mean something to me deeply.

The thing I always say to people is this: ‚If you avoid failure, you also avoid success.‘

I am being frank about myself in this book. I tell of my first mistake on page 850.

I’m the kind of person who needs to feel like everything happens for a reason. When you date a guy and it goes badly, that’s horrible. But if you can write a song about it, then it was worth it.

I’m a big believer in doing things that make you uncomfortable. So, we live in a world where we want to be as comfortable as we can. And we wonder why we have no growth. We wonder why – when the smallest thing in our life gets difficult – we wonder why we cower and we run away.

Friendship with ones self is all important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else in the world.

These words dropped into my childish mind as if you should accidentally drop a ring into a deep well. I did not think of them much at the time, but there came a day in my life when the ring was fished up out of the well, good as new.

We know what we are, but know not what we may be.

As much as it might look like, to someone else, that I’m successful, I never feel like I’m anywhere. The further I go, I still feel equally further from my eventual goal. Because as I grow, I get more goals. I’m never content.

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

He who knows others is wise. He who knows himself is enlightened.

Monsters are real, and ghosts are real too. They live inside us, and sometimes, they win.

God hath given you one face, and you make yourselves another.

The truth is something that burns. It burns off dead wood. And people don’t like having the dead wood burnt off, often because they’re 95 percent dead wood.

My thought is me: that is why I cannot stop thinking. I exist because I think I cannot keep from thinking.

Money and time are the heaviest burdens of life, and… the unhappiest of all mortals are those who have more of either than they know how to use.

Life is one big road with lots of signs. So when you riding through the ruts, don’t complicate your mind. Flee from hate, mischief and jealousy. Don’t bury your thoughts, put your vision to reality. Wake Up and Live!

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

Buddhism teaches us not to try to run away from suffering. You have to confront suffering. You have to look deeply into the nature of suffering in order to recognize its cause, the making of the suffering.

Never complain. Never explain.

I built a label at the same time I built a career.

Meditation is difficult for many people because their thoughts are always on some distant object or place. One form of meditation is to label the thought as it appears and then choose to let it go.

Make yourself an honest man, and then you may be sure there is one less rascal in the world.

I woke up one day and thought: ‚I want to write a book about the history of my body.‘ I could justify talking about my mother because it was in her body that my body began.

I try to not focus on what people expect from me.

I don’t think a lot of people know personally who I am.

I was at a New Year’s Eve party, and someone asked me how was my year, and I said, ‚I honestly think 2011 was the best year of my entire life,‘ and I actually meant it.

It is in self-limitation that a master first shows himself.

My goal is to entertain myself and others.

The truth doesn’t hurt unless it ought to.

For a long time, I thought I was ugly and disfigured. This made me shy and timid, and I often reacted to insults that were not intended.

As long as a man stands in his own way, everything seems to be in his way.

I am the greatest, I said that even before I knew I was.

I’d like to be known for more than being the guy in the big suit.

Complaining is dangerous business. It can damage or even destroy your relationship with God, your relationships with other people, and even with your relationship with yourself.

Be not a slave of words.

You can’t have it all, all at once. Who – man or woman – has it all, all at once? Over my lifespan, I think I have had it all. But in different periods of time, things were rough. And if you have a caring life partner, you help the other person when that person needs it.

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

The only things worth learning are the things you learn after you know it all.

The power of our thoughts may never be measured or appreciated, but it became obvious to me as a young boy that there was value and power in being aware of my thoughts and how I expressed myself.

We are all sentenced to solitary confinement inside our own skins, for life.

I get nervous when I don’t get nervous. If I’m nervous I know I’m going to have a good show.

Don’t get older just to get wiser. If you get older, you will be wiser, I believe that – if you dare. But get older because it’s fun!

A lot of times, people feel that if they forgive the person who hurt them, then they will continue to take advantage of them or not take responsibility for what they did wrong.

I’m honest enough to say I don’t know everything. You know, I don’t. I don’t understand all of God. I don’t understand, you know, some kind of why bad things happen.

Every day we have plenty of opportunities to get angry, stressed or offended. But what you’re doing when you indulge these negative emotions is giving something outside yourself power over your happiness. You can choose to not let little things upset you.

In search of my mother’s garden, I found my own.

I think I’m like most people – we fear the unknown and the things that have yet to come to pass, which are the very things that don’t deserve to be feared. When you give God complete control, it’s very hard not to be fearless.

Yeah, I was a delinquent. It was when I was in the ninth grade. I was doing stupid stuff, and the cops came into the class. I was humiliated more than anything.