You cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you.

The reason that I’m here at all is because of my relationship with my family and their encouragement of me to be a musician and to work hard. As long as I stay there in that space, I can do anything. That’s my truth.

My philosophy is: It’s none of my business what people say of me and think of me.

It’s true that at the time I was fond of Kurt Vonnegut and Richard Brautigan, and it was from them that I learned about this kind of simple, swift-paced style, but the main reason for the style of my first novel is that I simply did not have the time to write sustained prose.

I like to choreograph and create and design the costumes and do it all and then step back and watch it and then move on to the next project.

When I was younger, I felt pressure to become someone else once I became successful.

I don’t regret anything.

I brought myself down. I impeached myself by resigning.

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

Nobody can give you wiser advice than yourself.

To be happy we must not be too concerned with others.

Breathe in deeply to bring your mind home to your body. Then look at, or think of, the person triggering this emotion: With mindfulness, you can see that she is unhappy, that she is suffering. You can see her wrong perceptions. You can see that she is not beautiful when she says things that are unkind.

Sometimes people write novels and they just be so wordy and so self-absorbed.

The fool wonders, the wise man asks.

I notice that my characters go out to dinner and have fun and take these great trips, but I spend so much time on their lives, I don’t have much of a personal life of my own. I have to sort of remember to fill out that little notebook on me.

The question of sexual dominance can exist only in the nightmare of that soul which has armed itself, totally, against the possibility of the changing motion of conquest and surrender, which is love.

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.

I don’t care much for equations myself. This is partly because it is difficult for me to write them down, but mainly because I don’t have an intuitive feeling for equations.

Freedom from effort in the present merely means that there has been effort stored up in the past.

My lighter, more superficial side will always steal a march on the deeper side and therefore always win. You can’t imagine how often I’ve tried to push away this Anne, which is only half of what is known as Anne – to beat her down, hide her.

I don’t go off and sit down and try to write material, because then it’s contrived and forced. I just live my life, and I see things in a word or a situation or a concept, and it will create a joke for me.

Educationists should build the capacities of the spirit of inquiry, creativity, entrepreneurial and moral leadership among students and become their role model.

I’m always cast in these strange men… that’s not me, really.

In college, I think I probably positioned myself as an aspiring writer, meaning I dressed sort of extravagantly and adopted all the semi-Byronic affectations, as if I were writing, although I wasn’t actually doing any writing.

Bhai was my hero and he had immense influence on me.

Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist.

I am 55 years old now. It takes three years to write one book. I don’t know how many books I will be able to write before I die. It is like a countdown. So with each book I am praying – please let me live until I am finished.

I was sure I’d set the world on fire, and it was hard for a young feller like me to realize the truth – that I hadn’t set the world on fire, and I was totally unprepared to handle the consequences if ‚The Big Trail‘ had been a success and launched me as a star.

Let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of the spirit.

Freedom is what you do with what’s been done to you.

I have fallen in love with the imagination. And if you fall in love with the imagination, you understand that it is a free spirit. It will go anywhere, and it can do anything.

Good writing is like a windowpane.

If you don’t know where you are going, every road will get you nowhere.

If they can make penicillin out of mouldy bread, they can sure make something out of you.

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

When you cease to exist, then who will you blame?

If a man knows not what harbor he seeks, any wind is the right wind.

I asked myself about the present: how wide it was, how deep it was, how much was mine to keep.

Music comes to me more readily than words.

I grew up in a funny way.

Man is an idea, and a precious small idea once he turns his back on love.

I think my vice would be outdoing myself.

Transformation literally means going beyond your form.

Understand this law and you will then know, beyond room for the slightest doubt, that you are constantly punishing yourself for every wrong you commit and rewarding yourself for every act of constructive conduct in which you indulge.

What comes out when life squeezes you? When someone hurts or offends you? If anger, pain and fear come out of you, it’s because that’s what’s inside.

If an idea isn’t exciting, you shouldn’t do it.

As much as I love the Western genre, I figured if I kept doing those, I’d eventually run out of steam on that, and that would’ve been the end of it.

When I found somebody who I fell in love with, it made me feel different than I felt the rest of the day. It was electrifying. That’s what inspired the ‚Off to the Races‘ melodies. That’s one of the times when you’re feeling electrified by someone else and they make you happy to be alive.

Trying to define yourself is like trying to bite your own teeth.

Good intentions never change anything. They only become a deeper and deeper rut.

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.

It is better to create than to learn! Creating is the essence of life.

I only wish that ordinary people had an unlimited capacity for doing harm; then they might have an unlimited power for doing good.

I really, truly believe that writing comes out of the body; of course, the mind is working as well, but it’s a double thing and that doubleness is united. I mean, you can’t separate persona from psyche; you just can’t do it.

I’ve been called a moron since I was about four. My father called me a moron. My grandfather said I was a moron. And a lot of times when I’m driving, I hear I’m a moron. I like being a moron.

I like criticism. It makes you strong.

The tragedy of life is what dies inside a man while he lives.

I just write what I wanted to write. I write what amuses me. It’s totally for myself. I never in my wildest dreams expected this popularity.

All intelligent thoughts have already been thought; what is necessary is only to try to think them again.

The highest reward that God gives us for good work is the ability to do better work.

The human body has two ends on it: one to create with and one to sit on. Sometimes people get their ends reversed. When this happens they need a kick in the seat of the pants.