“Fear makes us fiction writers.”

Higher values propel and elevate us toward happiness, fulfillment, and meaning. Lower values demote us toward anxiety, depression, and suffering.

All things are temporary and that we can’t truly own or control anything.

We think that success equals happiness, but this idea is an illusion.

A monk mind practices detachment. We realize that everything—from our houses to our families—is borrowed.

Find me someone who has gone to the darkest parts of their own character where they were so close to their own self-destruction and found a way to get up and out of it, and I will bow on my knees to you. You’re my teacher.

Because the only thing that stays with you from the moment you’re born until the moment you die is your breath. All your friends, your family, the country you live in, all of that can change. The one thing that stays with you is your breath.

The more we define ourselves in relation to the people around us, the more lost we are.

If you follow your bliss, he said, doors will open for you that wouldn’t have opened for anyone else

We say things to ourselves that we would never say to people we love

Too often we love people who don’t love us, but we fail to return the love of others who do.

What’s on your news feed is feeding your mind.

Everyone has a story, and sometimes our egos choose to ignore that. Don’t take everything personally—it is usually not about you.

So people who come to this place, stay here for a while, and then continue their journey. Sounds like a hotel to me.

Most of our communication is nonverbal.

It is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else’s life with perfection.

Every night when I’m falling asleep, I say to myself, I am relaxed, energized, and focused. I am calm, enthusiastic, and productive.

Tied to worldly illusions, our sight is but a painted vision.

If your eyes could speak what stories would it tell? Would it even be able to speak or would it end up choking on all the water?

Tell me you are not aching, tell me you’re pretending.

Be nice to whites, they need you to rediscover their humanity.

Happiness never seeks you, you have to seek it on your own.

It’s not how the world is, but that it is, that is cause for astonishment.

The velvet veins running through my deep-colored wings sing blues, remembering the non-existent maple memories, lighting up my heart’s frosty rays.

Talent hits a target no one else can hit. Genius hits a target no one else can see.