Only in being productively active can man make sense of his life.

Immature love says: 'I love you because I need you.' Mature love says 'I need you because I love you.'

Greed is a bottomless pit which exhausts the person in an endless effort to satisfy the need without ever reaching satisfaction.

It takes a moment to tell someone you love them, but it takes a lifetime to prove it.

Love isn't something natural. Rather it requires discipline, concentration, patience, faith, and the overcoming of narcissism. It isn't a feeling, it is a practice.

Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.

Man's main task in life is to give birth to himself, to become what he potentially is. The most important product of his effort is his own personality.

The lust for power is not rooted in strength but in weakness.

The task we must set for ourselves is not to feel secure, but to be able to tolerate insecurity.

The scars left from the child's defeat in the fight against irrational authority are to be found at the bottom of every neurosis.

To love somebody is not just a strong feeling - it is a decision, it is a judgment, it is a promise.

I wish I had lost an arm or a leg. It would have been much easier than losing a part of my heart, which lives on, but now beats to a different rhythm.

...heaven wouldn’t be like this earth, this tormented earth ruled by evil forces that tossed humanity to and fro like a slow clown in a two-bit rodeo.

It's really hard to smile when you play. As a performer, if I ever find myself focusing, it's like, 'Oh no - orchestra face!' It's not attractive at all, so I have to focus on smiling.

I enjoy pumping iron, but I do try and get the yoga, 'cause it's a nice balance to the weightlifting.

You will come to agree with me.

Being called a 'bad citizen' is a compliment to a novelist, at least to my mind. That's exactly what we ought to do.

I still have an insane drive to create and express myself, and it'll never stop because I don't know how to stop it.

When people help one another in sin and transgression, they finish by hating each other.

I am a better novelist than a poet, playwright, or essayist.

In terms of a "career," I never have long-term plans, and certainly don't want to spend several years, say, writing a "long" novel.