Now I realize that from ’72 through to about ’76, I was the ultimate rock star. I couldn’t have been more rock star.

People will try to bring you down, but you gotta go up.

What is necessary to change a person is to change his awareness of himself.

I want to work; then, as my kids get older, I want to have adventures. I want to visit all their countries: learn and live inside all their cultures.

Even as you make progress, you need the discipline to keep from backtracking and sabotaging the success as it’s happening.

If I love you, what business is it of yours?

Always do whatever’s next.

For time is the longest distance between two places.

I understand aggressiveness in only one way: being prepared to hurt yourself, not someone else.

The greatest mistake we make is living in constant fear that we will make one.

It is true that going out on to the street implies the risk of accidents happening, as they would to any ordinary man or woman. But if the church stays wrapped up in itself, it will age. And if I had to choose between a wounded church that goes out on to the streets and a sick, withdrawn church, I would definitely choose the first one.

The empty vessel makes the loudest sound.

No untroubled day has ever dawned for me.

We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch – we are going back from whence we came.

Music itself is going to become like running water or electricity. So it’s like, just take advantage of these last few years because none of this is ever going to happen again. You’d better be prepared for doing a lot of touring because that’s really the only unique situation that’s going to be left.

I always try to do as much as I can do. I’m never a person that does not enough, because I’d regret not doing enough and think I probably could have done more. I probably go too far and have to reel myself back in, which works in some things, and other things it doesn’t work.

Relish everything that’s inside of you, the imperfections, the darkness, the richness and light and everything. And that makes for a full life.

Narrow your life down to this moment. Your life situation may be full of problems – most life situations are – but find out if you have a problem at this moment. Do you have a problem now?

Thirty-three-years-old, still creating art. It’s rage, it’s creativity, it’s pain, it’s hurt, but it’s the opportunity to still have my voice get out there through music.

The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitudes.

When you face a ‚performance‘ that might provoke the ‚I’m scared‘ response, choose love and approach your opportunity as a chance to dance with God. It’s more fun than ‚Dancing with the Stars!‘

I went through a lot of battles in high school.

I realized the other day that I’ve lived in New York longer than I’ve lived anywhere else. It’s amazing: I am a New Yorker. It’s strange; I never thought I would be.

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

Success in its highest and noblest form calls for peace of mind and enjoyment and happiness which come only to the man who has found the work that he likes best.

In the struggle between yourself and the world second the world.

A shady business never yields a sunny life.

I do believe in the old saying, ‚What does not kill you makes you stronger.‘ Our experiences, good and bad, make us who we are. By overcoming difficulties, we gain strength and maturity.

In pop music, the public usually see the results – the hit records, the Grammy Awards performances, the concert tours – but not all the work that goes into getting into the spotlight. And not everyone realizes that, even if you have a lot of talent, chances are you won’t make it.

Trust not yourself, but your defects to know, make use of every friend and every foe.

In the practice of tolerance, one’s enemy is the best teacher.

Michael Jordan changed so much in basketball, he took his power to make a difference. It’s so much going on in music right now and somebody has to make a difference.

You’re just left with yourself all the time, whatever you do anyway. You’ve got to get down to your own God in your own temple. It’s all down to you, mate.

It definitely has learning a lesson about the way you’re living your life. I wouldn’t compare our movie to that, but it has a structure where it’s about a man who doesn’t appreciate all that he has and finds out at the end that life has been great and he has to enjoy that.

Great thoughts speak only to the thoughtful mind, but great actions speak to all mankind.

You will be as much value to others as you have been to yourself.

All I can do is be me, whoever that is.

I have had fun being who I became, so to speak.

It’s a philosophy of life. A practice. If you do this, something will change, what will change is that you will change, your life will change, and if you can change you, you can perhaps change the world.

You don’t have the same mentality as you did five years ago – even one year. People are always changing, and I believe that everyone deserves the space to change and for people to recognize their change.

It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.

Not until we are lost do we begin to understand ourselves.

One of the lessons that I grew up with was to always stay true to yourself and never let what somebody else says distract you from your goals. And so when I hear about negative and false attacks, I really don’t invest any energy in them, because I know who I am.

No memory of having starred atones for later disregard, or keeps the end from being hard.

There may sometimes be ungenerous attempts to keep a young man down; and they will succeed, too, if he allows his mind to be diverted from its true channel to brood over the attempted injury.

Stay active. Read the Word. Worship with other believers. Continue to give. Keep learning and growing. Your faith will be unleashed!

When we tackle obstacles, we find hidden reserves of courage and resilience we did not know we had. And it is only when we are faced with failure do we realise that these resources were always there within us. We only need to find them and move on with our lives.

Some people would like me to be round again.

My weaknesses have always been food and men – in that order.

Life is a series of experiences, each one of which makes us bigger, even though sometimes it is hard to realize this. For the world was built to develop character, and we must learn that the setbacks and grieves which we endure help us in our marching onward.

People can try to reinvent themselves. I don’t think you can really change who you are, though, because who you are is pretty much where you came from and what you’ve done up to now.

I’ve always written. There’s a journal which I kept from about 9 years old. The man who gave it to me lived across the street from the store and kept it when my grandmother’s papers were destroyed. I’d written some essays. I loved poetry, still do. But I really, really loved it then.

Last year we said, ‚Things can’t go on like this‘, and they didn’t, they got worse.

Fill your bowl to the brim and it will spill. Keep sharpening your knife and it will blunt.

Seek ye first the good things of the mind, and the rest will either be supplied or its loss will not be felt.

I don’t care if people I admire criticize me because their opinion is valuable to me.

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.

I don’t want to be something that just comes and goes.

It’s much worse to read criticism about your son than yourself.

I have always been regretting that I was not as wise as the day I was born.

Each has his past shut in him like the leaves of a book known to him by his heart, and his friends can only read the title.