“I can’t not put myself in the shoes of every person I pass.”

Fearlessness, absolutely. Discipline. You also need open-minded creativeness that lets everything in. You never want to lose a word or a phrase, yet every one should count. Always the best language possible. And, finally, knowing when to leave it alone. Stop when it’s done.

It’s not easy for a mother and son to sing a duet. You can’t just sing about anything.

My family owns a music store in Claremont, California, called The Claremont Folk Music Center.

Every single time I step into the studio, I say, ‘Can I still do this? Do I still have it? Have I ever had it?’ I suppose there’s a good amount of self-loathing that goes into any form of artisanship.

If I fall, I fall. I’ll rise up like anybody else.

You can kill a lot of time if you really want to put your mind to it Or leave it all behind and never really have to go through it

Let us burn one from end to end, and pass it over to me my friend.

Don’t be discouraged by writer’s block. Writer’s block just means you need to listen to other music.

Don’t let what you have to heal from blind you to how much there is to heal for.

I can change the world With my own two hands Make a better place With my own two hands Make a kinder place.

The woman in you is the worry in me.

As long as the songs are strong, I think you can express yourself in any style and have it be soulful and have it be your own voice.

I refuse to age disgracefully in rock ‘n’ roll.

I’m not going to do the Ben Harper house record or the Ben Harper drum ‘n’ bass record.

Make sure the fortune that you seek is the fortune that you need.

It just takes a pebble to bring down a good man.

It can happen that a book, unlike its authors, grows younger as the years pass.

Be moderate in eating and drinking. Mindful of the passing of time, engage yourself in zazen as though saving your head from fire.

What an absurd thing it is to pass over all the valuable parts of a man, and fix our attention on his infirmities.

Your memories are eroding away. The futures you anticipate, will mostly not come to pass, and the real richness is in the moment. And it’s not necessarily some kind of ‘Be Here Now’ feel-good thing because it doesn’t always feel good. But it always feels. It is a domain of feeling. It’s primary.

. It is the delicate fruit of a mature civilization; and scarcely a century has passed since nations, that knew the meaning of the term, resolved to be free.

The wise only possess ideas; the greater part of mankind are possessed by them.

This habit of reading, I make bold to tell you, is your pass to the greatest, the purest, and the most perfect pleasure that God has prepared for His creatures.

It is far easier for the proverbial camel to pass through the needle’s eye, hump and all, than for an erstwhile colonial administration to give sound and honest counsel of a political nature to its liberated territory.