We spend our lives, all of us, waiting for the great day, the great battle, or the deed of power. But that external consummation is not given to many: nor is it necessary. So long as our being is tensed, directed with passion, towards that which is the spirit of all things, then that spirit will emerge from our own hidden, nameless effort.

Neil Young is my hero, and such a great example. You know what that guy has been doing for the past 40 years? Making music. That’s what that guy does. Sometimes you pay attention, sometimes you don’t. Sometimes he hands it to you, sometimes he keeps it to himself. He’s a good man with a beautiful family and wonderful life.

There are two things a person should never be angry at, what they can help, and what they cannot.

Pretension is a poor joke that you play on yourself. Snap out of it. Recognise your strengths, work on your weaknesses. Real achievement is liking what you see in the mirror every morning.

Just remember, you can’t climb the ladder of success with your hands in your pockets.

Sometimes I think it would be easier to avoid old age, to die young, but then you’d never complete your life, would you? You’d never wholly know you.

As far as men go, it is not what they are that interests me, but what they can become.

The first thing which I can record concerning myself is, that I was born. These are wonderful words. This life, to which neither time nor eternity can bring diminution – this everlasting living soul, began. My mind loses itself in these depths.

There’s a deceptive sin that can keep us from walking in love: pride. It’s deceptive because when you have pride, you’re usually too proud to admit it. I know this because I used to have teachings on pride and they didn’t sell well.

If I am a cup maker, I’m interested in making the best cup I possibly can. My effort goes into that cup, not what people think about it.

The major value in life is not what you get. The major value in life is what you become.

The older you get, the better you get.

Basically, I live to do gigs.

If boyhood and youth are but vanity, must it not be our ambition to become men?

Akron, Ohio, is my home. It will always be remembered. Akron, Ohio, is my life.

To be idle and to be poor have always been reproaches, and therefore every man endeavors with his utmost care to hide his poverty from others, and his idleness from himself.

I made my fair share of mistakes.

Basketball is my passion, I love it. But my family and friends mean everything to me. That’s what’s important. I need my phone so I can keep in contact with them at all times.

If I get stuck, I look at a book that tells me how someone else did it. I turn the pages, and then I say, ‚Oh, I forgot that bit,‘ then close the book and carry on. Finally, after you’ve figured out how to do it, you read how they did it and find out how dumb your solution is and how much more clever and efficient theirs is!

Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens.

For me, writing has always come out of living a fairly to-the-bone kind of life, just really being present to a lot of life. The writing has been really a byproduct of that.

Life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quickly you hardly catch it going.

I always say, decisions I make, I live with them. There’s always ways you can correct them or ways you can do them better. At the end of the day, I live with them.

The best measure of a man’s honesty isn’t his income tax return. It’s the zero adjust on his bathroom scale.

Quality is not an act, it is a habit.

Make the most of yourself, for that is all there is of you.

When you play sports like tennis, you’re alone, and that’s a good school for life, but it’s also a good school for life to bring your best and make those around you better, too – helping others in difficult moments.

I know that I’m not the easiest person to live with. The challenge I put on myself is so great that the person I live with feels himself challenged. I bring a lot to bear, and I don’t know how not to.

My life is not unlike Truman’s. I can’t go anywhere.

I had nearly finished school because I was making effort not that bad on that. But there was a law in Germany after the war. You could not make your final examination before 18, so lots of people who were late because of the way had to do it first.

Many people mistake our work for our vocation. Our vocation is the love of Jesus.

Power is the measure of the degree of control you have over circumstances in your life and the actions of the people around you. It is a skill that is developed by a deep understanding of human nature, of what truly motivates people, and of the manipulations necessary for advancement and protection.

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

When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.

The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.

There is no passion to be found playing small – in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.

If you keep proving stuff that others have done, getting confidence, increasing the complexities of your solutions – for the fun of it – then one day you’ll turn around and discover that nobody actually did that one!

The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.

Acting is just a way of making a living, the family is life.

Those who have been writing literature have not been writing life.

If you don’t like the road you’re walking, start paving another one.

I’m not the same man I used to be, I’m not out hell-raising, stuff like that. I am a changed man.

You might sooner get lightning out of incense smoke than true action or passion out of your modern English religion.

In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.

Our whole life is set up in the path of least resistance. We don’t want to suffer. We don’t want to feel discomfort. So the whole time, we’re living our lives in a very comfortable area. There’s no growth in that.

I argue thee that love is life. And life hath immortality.

All my life I’ve looked at words as though I were seeing them for the first time.

Writing’s just as natural to me as getting up and cooking breakfast.

We should be too big to take offense and too noble to give it.

Anything I do, I want to do it well.

Let each become all that he was created capable of being.

Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

What keeps me motivated is love and passion.

So long as the memory of certain beloved friends lives in my heart, I shall say that life is good.

True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us.

When people are lame, they love to blame.

The essence of philosophy is that a man should so live that his happiness shall depend as little as possible on external things.

I never had to choose a subject – my subject rather chose me.

Do we not realize that self respect comes with self reliance?

Get mad, then get over it.

I want to solidify as an artist and show that as I grow as a person and make mistakes and learn from them, I’m going to grow artistically.