The man who can centre his thoughts and hopes upon something transcending self can find a certain peace in the ordinary troubles of life, which is impossible to the pure egoist.

The only service a friend can really render is to keep up your courage by holding up to you a mirror in which you can see a noble image of yourself.

I think war is so incredibly backward, and I don’t think it’s intelligent, and it’s not sane. So why would you want to support it?

The great epochs of our life are the occasions when we gain the courage to rebaptize our evil qualities as our best qualities.

I’ve had no contact with my daughter for years. That’s her choice. Anyway, you move on. If people don’t want to bother with me, fine. You know, God bless them, and move on.

If a man does not make new acquaintances as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man, sir, should keep his friendship in a constant repair.

My ultimate goal is to end up being happy. Most of the time.

Take time to gather up the past so that you will be able to draw from your experience and invest them in the future.

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

A nation or civilization that continues to produce soft-minded men purchases its own spiritual death on the installment plan.

We must all suffer one of two things: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret or disappointment.

I know that I always wanted things. I was always proud of my people, proud of my home, but I always wanted more. I think most people do.

Everybody wants to be somebody; nobody wants to grow.

I don’t want to just revolve. I want to evolve. As a man, as a human, as a father, as a lover.

With fame, you know, you can read about yourself, somebody else’s ideas about you, but what’s important is how you feel about yourself – for survival and living day to day with what comes up.

The man who complains about the way the ball bounces is likely the one who dropped it.

I learned to fly a few years ago in England. It’s the only place I’m completely alone – up in the air, detached from everything.

Don’t throw stones at your neighbors if your own windows are glass.

Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.

When I wake up in the morning, I feel just like any other insecure 24-year-old girl.

The greatest day in your life and mine is when we take total responsibility for our attitudes. That’s the day we truly grow up.

One’s philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes… and the choices we make are ultimately our responsibility.

An economically peaceful and prosperous Sri Lanka is the dream of youth of the nation. My message for the youth is to collectively work for an inclusively developed Sri Lanka.

I have so much in my life. I want to be of value to the world.

When a man asks himself what is meant by action he proves that he isn’t a man of action. Action is a lack of balance. In order to act you must be somewhat insane. A reasonably sensible man is satisfied with thinking.

My main goal is to be a self-made man and have control over what’s mine.

Time is kind of an amazing thing because you can do so much with it. I think people underestimate time… I don’t want to just sit on my phone for hours.

I have no desire to crow over anybody or to see anybody eating crow, figuratively or otherwise. We should all get together and make a country in which everybody can eat turkey whenever he pleases.

The moment the alarm goes off is the first test; it sets the tone for the rest of the day. The test is not a complex one: when the alarm goes off, do you get up out of bed, or do you lie there in comfort and fall back to sleep? If you have the discipline to get out of bed, you win – you pass the test.

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.

Frankly, I think that the news industry is critically important because it points out things and surfaces truths that can often be uncomfortable. I think that that’s working, and the spotlight has been pointed on things that we have a responsibility to do better, and I accept that.

Remember that your imagination is yours and yours alone. You have the inborn capacity to use it in any way that you choose. No one else is responsible for your imagination. Anything placed in your imagination and held there ultimately becomes your reality.

I don’t have all the answers.

Fighting for one’s freedom, struggling towards being free, is like struggling to be a poet or a good Christian or a good Jew or a good Muslim or good Zen Buddhist. You work all day long and achieve some kind of level of success by nightfall, go to sleep and wake up the next morning with the job still to be done. So you start all over again.

A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.

Idleness is the beginning of all vice, the crown of all virtues.

Desperation is a necessary ingredient to learning anything, or creating anything. Period. If you ain’t desperate at some point, you ain’t interesting.

I thought it completely absurd to mention my name in the same breath as the presidency.

I feel like this: Whatever is in your path and in your heart, you need to do.

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.

Little by little, not by making big promises, I need to be calmer, read more, spend more time with my loved ones, and be more mindful about nature and environment.

I was in a queer mood, thinking myself very old: but now I am a woman again – as I always am when I write.

You make yourself broad. You make yourself appealing. ‚Hey, y’all, I’m cool with everybody.‘ That’s my message.

I am so clever that sometimes I don’t understand a single word of what I am saying.

The art of being a slave is to rule one’s master.

Don’t just read the easy stuff. You may be entertained by it, but you will never grow from it.

We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aid, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn.

I’ve never been shy or secretive with the fact that if you walk into my life, you may be walking onto a record.

The man who acquires the ability to take full possession of his own mind may take possession of anything else to which he is justly entitled.

Help others and give something back. I guarantee you will discover that while public service improves the lives and the world around you, its greatest reward is the enrichment and new meaning it will bring your own life.

I’m not interested in more political or cultural combat.

Every man casts a shadow; not his body only, but his imperfectly mingled spirit. This is his grief. Let him turn which way he will, it falls opposite to the sun; short at noon, long at eve. Did you never see it?

A learned blockhead is a greater blockhead than an ignorant one.

Being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn.

All we are saying is give peace a chance.

I used to have insecurity about my finances, then I announced that I had debt, and now I don’t have any insecurities.

Always remember that others may hate you but those who hate you don’t win unless you hate them. And then you destroy yourself.

Courage is the most important of all the virtues, because without courage you can’t practice any other virtue consistently. You can practice any virtue erratically, but nothing consistently without courage.

What’s the greater risk? Letting go of what people think – or letting go of how I feel, what I believe, and who I am?

One of the most important decisions you’ll ever make is choosing the kind of universe you exist in: is it helpful and supportive or hostile and unsupportive? Your answer to this question will make all the difference in terms of how you live your life and what kind of Divine assistance you attract.

It’s dangerous to read the Internet about yourself when you’re me. Or when you’re anyone in the public eye.