Your love is not outside; it is deep within you. You can never lose it, and it cannot leave you. It is not dependent on some other body, some external form.

It is in our lives and not our words that our religion must be read.

The only tyrant I accept in this world is the still voice within.

You know, it’s not the world that was my oppressor, because what the world does to you, if the world does it to you long enough and effectively enough, you begin to do to yourself.

I cannot always control what goes on outside. But I can always control what goes on inside.

Everything you need you already have. You are complete right now, you are a whole, total person, not an apprentice person on the way to someplace else. Your completeness must be understood by you and experienced in your thoughts as your own personal reality.

Really, who you are is defined by the people who you know – not even the people that you know, but the people you spend time with and the people that you love and the people that you work with. I guess we show your friends in your profile, but that’s kind of different from the information you put in your profile.

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.

The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions.

It is not necessary that you leave the house. Remain at your table and listen. Do not even listen, only wait. Do not even wait, be wholly still and alone. The world will present itself to you for its unmasking, it can do no other, in ecstasy it will writhe at your feet.

The more you know of your history, the more liberated you are.

I am my own sanctuary and I can be reborn as many times as I choose throughout my life.

I can very well do without God both in my life and in my painting, but I cannot, suffering as I am, do without something which is greater than I am, which is my life, the power to create.

It’s simple, if it jiggles, it’s fat.

There is no value in life except what you choose to place upon it and no happiness in any place except what you bring to it yourself.

There is a difference between happiness and wisdom: he that thinks himself the happiest man is really so; but he that thinks himself the wisest is generally the greatest fool.

I have lost my mental faculties but am perfectly well.

The ego is nothing other than the focus of conscious attention.

As we grow old, the beauty steals inward.

Every man can tell how many goats or sheep he possesses, but not how many friends.

Part of me suspects that I’m a loser, and the other part of me thinks I’m God Almighty.

I love people talking about me; I love anybody just looking at me.

I get naturally uncomfortable when I’m put under a magnifying glass.

Happiness is within the reach of everyone, rich or poor. Yet comparatively few people are happy. I believe the reason for this is that the majority don’t recognize happiness even when it is within their grasp.

To know yet to think that one does not know is best; Not to know yet to think that one knows will lead to difficulty.

Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.

I’m actually a very honest person, and sometimes I end up like, ‚Man, I said too much.‘ It’s hard for me not to tell the truth when you ask me.

If you leave the smallest corner of your head vacant for a moment, other people’s opinions will rush in from all quarters.

Our personal intelligence is everlasting and divine.

Why should it be essential to love rarely in order to love much?

People should not make me out to be like Jesus; I don’t walk on water.

People who boast about their I.Q. are losers.

If you desire to be good, begin by believing that you are wicked.

I have total recall. I remember being born. I remember being in the womb, I remember being inside. Coming out was great.

If you start to think of your physical and moral condition, you usually find that you are sick.

I don’t know that you can put a label on growth. I’m just me.

I’m not the most patient of people.

As we must account for every idle word, so must we account for every idle silence.

I prefer tongue-tied knowledge to ignorant loquacity.

Any man or institution that tries to rob me of my dignity will lose.

The way I approach this thing, when I started to get my head screwed on straight and really trying to make something of myself as an artist, when I was 19 or 20, it became more about function for me. Like, what is this song doing to you? What is the function of this type of artform? What is it doing?

I am easily satisfied with the very best.

Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.

Is pride, the never-failing vice of fools.

Self-worth comes from one thing – thinking that you are worthy.

I can do whatever I want.

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

I’m not a complete psychopath. Am I partially? Sure. I’ll accept that. But I’m not a complete psychopath.

I’m no leader; I’m a little humble follower.

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

Immaturity is the incapacity to use one’s intelligence without the guidance of another.

I’ve always been – you know, my personality is motivating and encouraging. And so I’m just being who God made me to be.

Sometimes, I think if you get away from what you’re called to do, it’s more of a distraction.

The pressure of adversity does not affect the mind of the brave man… It is more powerful than external circumstances.

I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance.

Even if you’re happy with the life you’ve chosen, you’re still curious about the other options.

It was completely fruitless to quarrel with the world, whereas the quarrel with oneself was occasionally fruitful and always, she had to admit, interesting.

Why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me.

I will praise any man that will praise me.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.

I’ve had no problem harnessing anger.