My father wasn’t around when I was a kid, and I used to always say, ‚Why me? Why don’t I have a father? Why isn’t he around? Why did he leave my mother?‘ But as I got older I looked deeper and thought, ‚I don’t know what my father was going through, but if he was around all the time, would I be who I am today?‘

The people of Northern Ireland have sorted out my whole life.

We need to, you know, restore people. We need to show mercy. I mean, because as much mercy as you show people, that’s the mercy you’re going to be receiving.

The person who has lived the most is not the one with the most years but the one with the richest experiences.

If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.

I gather from motivation around me – from a lot of personalities who have done well in their respective fields.

I’m kind of fascist with myself, you know.

If I went back to my 20-year-old self, what I would tell my 20-year-old self is, ‚You don’t know anything.‘ Because everyone, when they’re young, they think they know what’s going on in the world, and you don’t.

The hardest thing to see is what is in front of your eyes.

My mother was a powerful influence. She made me toe the line. If I didn’t have a perfect report card, she showed her disappointment.

If I had only one sermon to preach it would be a sermon against pride.

What money is better bestowed than that of a schoolboy’s tip? How the kindness is recalled by the recipient in after days! It blesses him that gives and him that takes.

I had given up some youth for knowledge, but my gain was more valuable than the loss.

Because you know when you first become famous, you start walking a little different because people are staring at you.

We shall see but a little way if we require to understand what we see.

I’m a super-duper over-analyzer. You mix that with self-doubt and pressure, and that’s never healthy.

Hell is yourself and the only redemption is when a person puts himself aside to feel deeply for another person.

These things bring you to reality as to how fragile you are; at the same moment you are doing something that nobody else is able to do. The same moment that you are seen as the best, the fastest and somebody that cannot be touched, you are enormously fragile.

In order to understand the world, one has to turn away from it on occasion.

I try to speak plainly so that my constituents who don’t follow the nuances of government like I do, because they’re too busy earning a real living, can understand the issues before me. None of this stuff is brain surgery.

I like being able to be on the inside of music, rather than on the outside listening to it.

I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don’t notice it.

A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it.

When you’re in prison, you want to know that you were thought about.

He had read much, if one considers his long life; but his contemplation was much more than his reading. He was wont to say that if he had read as much as other men he should have known no more than other men.

The resistance that you fight physically in the gym and the resistance that you fight in life can only build a strong character.

We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn’t want to meet.

There are no eternal facts, as there are no absolute truths.

How lucky Adam was. He knew when he said a good thing, nobody had said it before.

Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is man.

I think my worst problem is actually living in the moment and understanding everything that’s going on. I feel like I’m in my own bubble.

If it wasn’t for baseball, I’d be in either the penitentiary or the cemetery.

I am my own sanctuary and I can be reborn as many times as I choose throughout my life.

Human beings can alter their lives by altering their attitudes of mind.

The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.

If you are against yourself, you will never reach your highest potential. And when you criticize yourself, you’re criticizing God.

Maybe ‚loner‘ is too strong a word, but I’ve always enjoyed being on my own.

I always wanted a family.

If your inner life is not producing what you would like on the outside, don’t be discouraged… just be willing to change.

Common looking people are the best in the world: that is the reason the Lord makes so many of them.

You cannot let where you are today cause you to get stuck. I’m going to be my best right now. That’s what faith is all about.

What do I think of Western civilization? I think it would be a very good idea.

Meditation is to get insight, to get understanding and compassion, and when you have them, you are compelled to act.

However my parents – both of whom came from impoverished backgrounds and neither of whom had been to college, took the view that my overactive imagination was an amusing quirk that would never pay a mortgage or secure a pension.

To enjoy freedom we have to control ourselves.

If a man could have half of his wishes, he would double his troubles.

There is no room for military people, including our veterans, to see themselves as victims, even if so many of our countrymen are prone to relish that role.

There are no such things as Flowers there are only gladdened Leaves.

The drama and the trauma of the relationship you have when you’re 16 can mirror the one you have when you’re 26. Life repeats itself.

Creativity has got to start with humanity and when you’re a human being, you feel, you suffer. You’re gay, you’re sick, you’re nervous or whatever.

I’m not claiming divinity. I’ve never claimed purity of soul. I’ve never claimed to have the answers to life. I only put out songs and answer questions as honestly as I can… But I still believe in peace, love and understanding.

Most people already know what they’re doing wrong. When I get them to church I want to tell them that you can change.

Why should anybody be interested in some old man who was a failure?

Now that I understand that I’m an addict, I definitely have compassion for my mother. I get it.

Listen, I think that people want a president who is going to be interested in the things that keep them up at night, the things that are weighing on them, the things that are debilitating and can be addressed.

Difficulties strengthen the mind, as labor does the body.

On a given day, a given circumstance, you think you have a limit.

When you are discontent, you always want more, more, more. Your desire can never be satisfied. But when you practice contentment, you can say to yourself, ‚Oh yes – I already have everything that I really need.‘

Life is not living in the suburbs with a white picket fence. That’s not life. Somehow our American culture has made it out that that’s what life needs to be – and that if it’s not that, it’s all screwed up. It’s not.

My experience has been that work is almost the best way to pull oneself out of the depths.

It’s so easy to settle for less than God’s best for us because we don’t always feel like taking responsibility for our behavior or putting forth some effort to do what we need to do so we can accomplish great things for God and help people. But the cost of settling for less is actually harder than being completely obedient to God’s will.