You don’t need anybody to tell you who you are or what you are. You are what you are!

I am being frank about myself in this book. I tell of my first mistake on page 850.

To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else – means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.

Remember, always give your best. Never get discouraged. Never be petty. Always remember, others may hate you. But those who hate you don’t win unless you hate them. And then you destroy yourself.

This soul, or life within us, by no means agrees with the life outside us. If one has the courage to ask her what she thinks, she is always saying the very opposite to what other people say.

Begin to see yourself as a soul with a body rather than a body with a soul.

Especially for those of us who lived in single cells, you had the time to sit down and think, and we discovered that sitting down just to think is one of the best ways of keeping yourself fresh and able, to be able to address the problems facing you, and you had the opportunity, also, of examining your past.

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.‘

How people themselves perceive what they are doing is not a question that interests me.

I don’t believe in doing things to manufacture my body to appeal to what I think people might like.

Ordinary riches can be stolen; real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you.

If you’re always under the pressure of real identity, I think that is somewhat of a burden.

I am who I am and I say what I think. I’m not putting a face on for the record.

Talk to a man about himself and he will listen for hours.

I already am a product.

We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful what we pretend to be.

Key is never be afraid of being yourself. Never!

Every man should know, if you’re comfortable and you like it, you should do it. Everyone always worries about what the girls think, what the guys think. If you like it, do it.

I’ve seen zero evidence of any nation on Earth other than Mexico even remotely having the slightest clue what Mexican food is about or even come close to reproducing it. It is perhaps the most misunderstood country and cuisine on Earth.

I can simply tell you that since I was a kid, I didn’t like to look like anyone else.

I’ve always done whatever I want and always been exactly who I am.

Everything deep is also simple and can be reproduced simply as long as its reference to the whole truth is maintained. But what matters is not what is witty but what is true.

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

It is not love that should be depicted as blind, but self-love.

Women, like men, should try to do the impossible. And when they fail, their failure should be a challenge to others.

The best author will be the one who is ashamed to become a writer.

Remember you are just an extra in everyone else’s play.

I think all women go through periods where we hate this about ourselves, we don’t like that. It’s great to get to a place where you dismiss anything you’re worried about. I find flaws attractive. I find scars attractive.

I was never particularly fond of my voice.

Single life is so overrated.

A sex symbol becomes a thing. I just hate to be a thing.

People look at the same passage, and one person will say this is the best thing he’s ever read, and another person will say it’s absolutely idiotic. I mean, there’s no way to reconcile those two things. You just have to forget the whole business of what people are saying.

It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance.

Know thyself? If I knew myself I would run away.

Almost every man wastes part of his life attempting to display qualities which he does not possess.

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

Our passions are like convulsion fits, which, though they make us stronger for a time, leave us the weaker ever after.

I wake up every morning in a house that was built by slaves, and I watch my daughters – two beautiful, intelligent black young women – playing with their dogs on the White House lawn. And because of Hillary Clinton, my daughters, and all our sons and daughters, now take for granted that a woman can be president of the United States.

If small things have the power to disturb you, then who you think you are is exactly that: small.

I don’t know who I would have been if I never watched MotoGP.

I learned, when I look in the mirror and tell my story, that I should be myself and not peep whatever everybody is doing.

The ego is only an illusion, but a very influential one. Letting the ego-illusion become your identity can prevent you from knowing your true self. Ego, the false idea of believing that you are what you have or what you do, is a backwards way of assessing and living life.

The only shame is to have none.

We are second-hand people. We have lived on what we have been told, either guided by our inclinations, our tendencies, or compelled to accept by circumstances and environment. We are the result of all kinds of influences, and there is nothing new in us, nothing that we have discovered for ourselves: nothing original, pristine, clear.

Wisdom ceases to be wisdom when it becomes too proud to weep, too grave to laugh, and too selfish to seek other than itself.

One can not reflect in streaming water. Only those who know internal peace can give it to others.

I’ve never bought into any sort of hard and fast, this-box/that-box characterization. People are individuals. Yes, they may be expected to be a particular way. But that doesn’t mean they’re going to be that way.

My body is quite tiny, but a lot of the emotions I feel are pretty explosive. They have to come out.

Remember: your bosses prefer to keep you in dependent positions. It is in their interest that you do not become self-reliant, and so they will tend to hoard information. You must secretly work against this and seize this information for yourself.

To know, is to know that you know nothing. That is the meaning of true knowledge.

The Canteen Boy, the reason you feel bad for him and you can laugh is because he, and I guess a lot of my characters, they don’t notice they’re getting made fun of. So they’ll say something back that’s not that great a quip, but in their mind they won the argument.

Somebody’s boring me. I think it’s me.

I’m very secure about my talents and about who I am.

Most people are happy being average. Most are happy being faceless in a sea of faces.

A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves.

Egos are never nice. I have been a victim of it a lot of times in my career. Whenever I have used it, I have failed.

Never was it given to mortal man – To lie so boldly as we women can.

What you have outside you counts less than what you have inside you.

Everybody has a purpose.

You have to be someone.

People like to build their own story about my life. I don’t know if it makes them feel better, or if it makes it okay for them to not like me, but the last thing I grew up as was rich.