There’s no reality except the one contained within us. That’s why so many people live an unreal life. They take images outside them for reality and never allow the world within them to assert itself.

I’m one of them guys that tries to make everything the best of the best, so sometimes I’m out of control with it.

I guess every single word I’ve ever said is going to be dissected now.

Reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.

When I was very young I was sort of floored by the fact that my mother and my father and everyone I knew was going to die one day, and myself too. I had a sort of a philosophical crisis. I couldn’t believe that we were mortal.

I was terrible in English. I couldn’t stand the subject. It seemed to me ridiculous to worry about whether you spelled something wrong or not, because English spelling is just a human convention – it has nothing to do with anything real, anything from nature.

Without deep reflection one knows from daily life that one exists for other people.

It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.

I knew that I was ‚interesting‘ at 18 because I was aware that I could get away with doing things on stage.

It didn’t even occur to me that I’m the last person in the world who should play salsa or Brazilian music.

It all depends on how we look at things, and not how they are in themselves.

Our heart glows, and secret unrest gnaws at the root of our being. Dealing with the unconscious has become a question of life for us.

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

There are very few people who are going to look into the mirror and say, ‚That person I see is a savage monster;‘ instead, they make up some construction that justifies what they do.

All that we call ideal in Greek or any other art, because to us it is false and visionary, was, to the makers of it, true and existent.

I long remained a child, and I am still one in many respects.

No parent is perfect; we all can look back and think of things we could’ve done to help our children be better prepared for adulthood. And sometimes it’s best to admit it to them and encourage them to learn from our mistakes.

Washington is a very easy city for you to forget where you came from and why you got there in the first place.

Even with all the advantages of retrospect, and a lot of witnesses dead and gone, you can’t make your life look as if you intended it or you were consistent. All you can show is how you dealt with various hands.

I have the habit of attention to such excess, that my senses get no rest – but suffer from a constant strain.

If you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won’t see why we go.

All men are frauds. The only difference between them is that some admit it. I myself deny it.

We have lost contact with reality, the simplicity of life.

I’m trying to keep a level head. You have to be careful out in the world. It’s so easy to get turned.

Perception often lags behind reality, and I can say from experience that the vast majority of public officials in Louisiana are much better than our reputation holds us to be.

I had nothing growing up, but I always wanted to be ‚sexy,‘ even before I knew what the word was.

I used to let other people’s struggles affect my happiness. If they weren’t happy, there was no way I was going to be happy. The opposite was also true: If I wasn’t happy, I didn’t want anyone around me to be happy.

My life is real.

Self-pity in its early stage is as snug as a feather mattress. Only when it hardens does it become uncomfortable.

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

Mere humans who root through their refrigerators at three o’clock in the morning can only produce writing that matches what they do. And that includes me.

Like all dreamers, I mistook disenchantment for truth.

I think there is a lot made out of age, and what age you feel.

The less you know, the more you believe.

All great and beautiful work has come of first gazing without shrinking into the darkness.

We have a choice about how we take what happens to us in our life and whether or not we allow it to turn us. We can become consumed by hate and darkness, or we’re able to regain our humanity somehow, or come to terms with things and learn something about ourselves.

I’m still living at least five parallel lives, honestly! I wonder about it. I have no idea how that happens.

A noble man compares and estimates himself by an idea which is higher than himself; and a mean man, by one lower than himself. The one produces aspiration; the other ambition, which is the way in which a vulgar man aspires.

In the West, as well as some other parts of the world, the personal sense of ego tends to predominate, whereas in other areas, there is a more collective sense of ego. This collective ego emphasizes the ‚we‘ rather than the ‚I.‘

The more I see the less I know for sure.

As the biggest library if it is in disorder is not as useful as a small but well-arranged one, so you may accumulate a vast amount of knowledge but it will be of far less value than a much smaller amount if you have not thought it over for yourself.

Glance into the world just as though time were gone: and everything crooked will become straight to you.

Adventuring can be for the ordinary person with ordinary qualities, such as I regard myself.

I change my mind a lot. I usually don’t agree with what I say very much. I’m an awful liar.

Beauty is all very well at first sight; but who ever looks at it when it has been in the house three days?

When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.

I know where I’m going and I know the truth, and I don’t have to be what you want me to be. I’m free to be what I want.

Where sense is wanting, everything is wanting.

My overall look on things is a lot more mature than it used to be.

If my critics saw me walking over the Thames they would say it was because I couldn’t swim.

What we seek we shall find; what we flee from flees from us.

Catering to bad feelings feeds and empowers them.

I don’t look at myself as a commodity, but I’m sure a lot of people have.

I was raised in a family where vulnerability was barely tolerated: no training wheels on our bicycles, no goggles in the pool, just get it done. And so I grew up not only with discomfort about my own vulnerability, I didn’t care for it in other people either.

It creeps me out sometimes to think of the person I was. I was a terrible person. I was mean to people.

I have an existential map. It has ‚You are here‘ written all over it.

I think that, ah, I’m a very goofy sort of person in many ways.

Whoever blushes is already guilty; true innocence is ashamed of nothing.

Each one has to find his peace from within. And peace to be real must be unaffected by outside circumstances.

The intelligent man finds almost everything ridiculous, the sensible man hardly anything.

There is no such thing as paranoia. Your worst fears can come true at any moment.