Only locks in life are what you think you know, but don’t. Accept your ignorance and try something new.

Am I an old man who changed into a butterfly, or a butterfly who thinks he was once an old man?

Like a fire alarm going off in your ear, sulfur up your nose, mouth full of sour milk, reality is what it is – you deal with it.

You’re the only you you get in this life! Show a little appreciation!

Laughter erupted from her belly and shot out her mouth like pigeons through an open cage door, schoolchildren bursting into summer vacation, water from a tapped hydrant.

The world of literature is a sacred mirror that shows not the reality around us but the dreams and fears that reality stimulates: It’s not where we live, but life itself.

We’re all given gifts in life, it’s what we do with them that shows us what we’ve learned.

Panties are a privilege, not a right.

Religion becomes a state of mind achievable in almost any activity of life, if this activity is raised to a suitable level of perfection.

Anyone can sit down and write some boring artistic song. Pop music is the hardest [stuff] to write.

There's need to be some sort of disturbance in your psyche for creativity to be sparked.

If you are around a lot of human beings who are filled with jealousy and anger and rage and desire, it filters into the mind. Zen is writing a new program to run in the mind.

Play by the rules, but be ferocious.

I can't play piano like I used to either. I used to have bass rolling like thunder. I can't do that no more. But I ask the Lord, please forgive me for the stuff I done trying to make a nickel.

It took awhile for me to get used to speaking candidly about my own life. I got into it, and it turned out to be a wonderful experience.

What is hope but futility for moments stood on end.