“To me, that’s the key thing, the pursuit of happiness. That’s the basic, ultimate freedom.”

What is life but being conscious? And good and evil are manifestations of consciousness. If you reject one, you’re not getting the whole thing that’s there to be had.

Everything is traditionally slow – much faster than it ever has been on earth but still far, far too slow.

There’s a lot there to enlarge you. That’s part of the value of being in an extended family is that it enlarges you. It makes you bigger. It makes you more.

And as far as I’m concerned, it’s like I say, drugs are not the problem. Other stuff is the problem.

I’ll try any guitar just to see if it’s different in an effort to see if it will lead me anywhere.

I don’t know why, it’s the same reason why you like some music and you don’t like others. There’s something about it that you like. Ultimately I don’t find it’s in my best interests to try and analyze it, since it’s fundamentally emotional.

Run faster, jump higher, reach farther, and you’ll always win!

You can’t repeat things because each time is different. The universe has changed. Everything has changed.

The Grateful Dead plays at religious services essentially.

Music is a universal language insofar as you don’t need to know anything else about a musician that you are playing with other than that they can play music.

Too much of a good thing is just about right

And when you don’t have to talk to the person next to you, that’s real clean. Takes a certain thing not to try to keep anything up, not to have to entertain one another.

I read somewhere that 77 per cent of all the mentally ill live in poverty. Actually, I’m more intrigued by the 23 per cent who are apparently doing quite well for themselves.

How many Beethovens are there that just for lack of the training, the world doesn’t get exposed to.

What’s been great about the human race gives you a sense of how great you might get, how far you can reach.

I’m goin’ where the wind don’t blow so strange, maybe off on some high cold mountain chain.

I guess if people all followed the basic principles of their own religions, they would love everybody instead of hating half the world.

Punk rock really influenced me, the basic metal bands, Zeppelin, Stones and Floyd, and Southern rock bands. I think I was pretty well-rounded.

And playing them really sloppy. Keeping it very basic-and using only a few notes-and playing slowly with perfect rhythm is a task in itself.

I was literally reduced to basic breath and blinks while she inhabited my vessel and told her story through me.

I couldn’t think. The basics of my life seemed altered and thrown into question.

Invest in basic research and recruit the best minds.

The basic notion of justice, is that the rights of everybody are equals, in principle. In the rights of others, we have to respect our own rights. It is only in that condition that we can reasonnably require that it be respected by others.

My father insisted that I learnt the Koran and encouraged me to understand the basic traditions and beliefs of Islam but without imposing any particular views. He was an overwhelming personality but open-minded and liberal.