I think that in school I was really shy. And even today when people meet me they are shock to see just how not-crazy I am.

I think with each record, I don't know ... they're like burdens.

The songs that give you the most trouble become your best songs.

You go through that stage where you're coming up with the concept, ideas and all that you need to make a record. It always feels like hard labor.

It sometimes takes 6 months or more after you've written and recorded it before you can start to enjoy the experience of singing the song.

I think with the live shows it's giving you that opportunity to do something on stage that you don't normally do.

Nobody climbs mountains for scientific reasons. Science is used to raise money for the expeditions, but you really climb for the hell of it.

It is wise to turn circumstances to good account.

Fiction is the lie through which we tell the truth.

There is a war that makes us adore our conquerors and despise ourselves.

The oppression of women is the single most corrosive and urgent problem of our time.

The promise, made when I am in love, to be true to the beloved as long as I live, commits me to being true even if I cease to be in love.

With movies and TV, storytelling, it's a different medium. I really love it, but I'm one part of many, many pieces of that puzzle and a lot of it is out of my control.

There isn't anything except your own life that can be used as ground for your spiritual practice. Spiritual practice is your life, twenty-four hours a day.

You don't talk about paintings, you look at them.

The sexual orientation of my parents has had zero effect on the content of my character.