“Recognizing how totally ignorant you are is the only honest way to deal with people who’ve been through something traumatic.”

I held the feeling in my heart; the urge to discuss it died out. There was all the time in the world. In the endless repetition of other nights, other mornings, this moment, too, might become a dream.

In the uncertain ebb and flow of time and emotions much of one’s life history is etched in the senses.

No matter what, I want to continue living with the awareness that I will die. Without that, I am not alive.

When was it I realized that, on this truly dark and solitary path we all walk, the only way we can light is our own? Although I was raised with love, I was always lonely. Someday, without fail, everyone will disappear, scattered into the blackness of time.

Everything in life has some good in it. And when something awful happens, the goodness stands out even more–it’s sad, but that’s the truth.

I felt how important the simplest things were, like feeling proud, finding something funny, stretching yourself, retreating into yourself.

No matter where you are, you’re always a bit on your own, always an outsider.

Sometimes people put up walls, not to keep others out, but to see who cares enough to break them down.

I spent most of my time thinking, because I didn’t have enough energy to do anything else.

Although I was raised with love, I was always lonely.

Love is the kind of thing that’s already happening by the time you notice it, that’s how it works, and no matter how old you get, that doesn’t change. Except that you can break it up into two entirely distinct types — love where there’s an end in sight and love where there isn’t.

If you don’t say what you’re thinking, you end up lying when you really need to speak up.

It occurred to me that if I were a ghost, this ambiance was what I’d miss most: the ordinary, day-to-day bustle of the living. Ghosts long, I’m sure, for the stupidest, most unremarkable things.

You have the nicest window, you know? None of the others can even compete. It´s not flashy like the others, or bleary – your window gives of this nice, quiet light.

Was that what it means to be an adult, to live with ugly ambiguities?

I really believe that no matter how old people get, they tend to change in certain ways depending on how people treat them – they change their colors.

I’ve always felt that I’m in a spontaneous business and if you script something, if you plan something, it will sound that way.

Everyone should fail in a big way at least once before reaching forty.

To exercise at or near capacity is the best way I know of reaching a true introspective state.

Louis Pasteur, the great scientist, said “chance favours the prepared mind”, which is a posh way of saying ‘do your homework’, but it’s an excellent piece of advice.

There’s no one who’s dropped on top of the mountain. You’ve got to work your way to the top.

We love America just as much as they do. But in a different way.

Writers who drew, they all seemed to draw the same way. They managed to keep that childlike creativity in their line.

When the Constitution was written, the founders had no way of anticipating the new technologies that would evolve in the coming centuries.