And in fact, I think the more we start to worship perfection the more soul leaks out of art.

A gourmet meal without a glass of wine just seems tragic to me somehow.

That's the great paradox of living on this earth, that in the midst of great pain you can have great joy as well. If we didn't have those things we'd just be numb.

Chocolate's okay, but I prefer a really intense fruit taste. You know when a peach is absolutely perfect... it's sublime. I'd like to capture that and then use it in a dessert.

You have to listen to what resonates within your own gut. You find your direction there. Your voice comes out.

You have to write badly to write at all. If it's crappy, I will rewrite it later. But it will be mine. You can hear the resonance of an artist who goes into herself.

If you say that you're all about a certain something, and look back and see that the choices that you've made don't reflect that, then there's something for you to look at.

You've got to dance like nobody's watching, and love like it's never going to hurt.

Standing knee deep in a river and dying of thirst.

I want to savor the aging process. As you get older, you trade your innocence for wisdom and the wisdom is your reward.

I can't even say I've begun yet, but I'm trying on the idea that there is a book in my future.

Men of power have not time to read, yet men who do not read are not fit for power.

Giving is stream of abundance.

Philosophy and Art both render the invisible visible by imagination.

Take adultery or theft. Merely sins. It is evil who dines on the soul, stretching out its long bone tongue. It is evil who tweezers my heart, picking out its atomic worms.

Water from the white fountain didn't taste any better than from the black fountain.

Ah, Ivy, thought Alexia happily, spreading a verbal fog wherever she goes.

When you're writing something and you know it's good, you get flushed, you can feel the blood coursing through your veins, you feel alive, all your nerve endings stand up, something just clicks.

Remember, no more effort is required to aim high in life, to demand abundance and prosperity, than is required to accept misery and poverty.

There's never going to be a great misunderstanding of me. I think I'm a little whacked.

What a labour writing is ... making one sentence do the work of a page; that's what I call hard work.