I used to get a sort of sociophobia, and I still get it sometimes these days when I'm in a confined space with too many people. It's not like I freak out or anything, it's just that I'm far more comfortable in my own company sometimes than being surr...
If you're Obama, can you imagine being lectured to about honesty and integrity from a convicted perjurer, Bill Clinton? My gosh, folks, I mean, literally how far has one fallen when that is the case?
I will be the first to admit that getting votes and getting an audience are two different things. For example, a politician really can't be elected if he's hated by half the people. A talk show host, however, can be an overwhelming national phenomeno...
To me, being popular means I've got more friends. You've got to watch who your friends are, if you want to get close to them, but I've got a lot of acquaintances. And then, you've got to be real careful who your friends are, because you never know wh...
Religion does not mean to worship cows. Religion is within the body of a human being. There is infinite power within this human body and manifestation of that power is Religion. In one sense it is the transformed state of ‘Ego’. Even if you don�...
Connubial Because with alarming accuracy she’d been identifying patterns I was unaware of—this tic, that tendency, like the way I've mastered the language of intimacy in order to conceal how I felt— I knew I was in danger of being terribly unde...
It took a bit of popcorn and a library snack bar to make me realize that being a librarian was about more than just giving people information. It was about serving a community. And if the community is hungry for more than just knowledge, then maybe i...
Animals have always been a passion of mine, being able to help them because they can't help themselves, and I think that people have treated them so badly over the years and it's just not fair. It's something I feel like I can help make a difference.
I've really been trying to go back to when I was 18 and rediscover the things that drove me, and my passions. How do I get back to being that strong? Because I feel like as I get older, I'm not as fearless as I was when I was 18.
I think portraying human beings trying to hold on to their humanity against pretty much certain odds that they'll die horribly in some way someday, and that they'll face horrible things along the way, I don't know - I think that's a beautiful thing. ...
Liberal Christianity, of course, has enemies, but they are everyone's enemies - sexism, racism, homophobia. But liberal versions of Christianity, which can be both theologically and politically conservative, assume that what it means to be Christian ...
Faith and reason are indeed complementary faculties that we use to think about the truth. When any winged creature (or mechanism) tries to fly on just one wing, it falls to the ground. In a similar way, when we human beings try to wing it with just o...
I grew up in Hollywood, California. A lot of my parents' friends were in the motion picture industry, but I saw their doctor friends as more solid. I admired them; there was a peacefulness in them, a sense of purpose that I liked. So I became very in...
I am not altogether confident of my ability to put my thoughts into words: My texts are usually better after an editor has hacked away at them, and I am used to both editing and being edited. Which is to say that I am not oversensitive in such matter...
My next memory is of waking up, it then being dark outside, and my brother and sister fast asleep on the couch. Sitting up I sensed something was broken. Maybe the night? It was open and alive with lights and noises and worried voices. The adults wer...
I think there's a very fine line between the type of performing that some actors do, and being in a state in your mind where you actually believe what's going on. If we weren't actors, what would we do with that ability? Would we not be slightly insa...
'Something More' is a song that I wrote not necessarily about country radio, more so about a lot of songs that were being pitched to me. I wrote that after song after song after song was just the same song, just a different melody, so I was just look...
Radical transparency has an enormous impact on our personal lives. We can no longer share thoughts, quips, photos or personal opinions anywhere on the web without being mindful that they may turn up where we least expect it (notably job interviews, d...
Once I began doing stand-up, I didn't get a kick out of the applause or being the centre of attention - but I did get a kick out of the jigsaw puzzle aspect of it, searching for the right bit, adding another few pieces each night until the bigger pic...
I went to law school. And I became a prosecutor. I took on a specialty that very few choose to pursue. I prosecuted child abuse and child homicide cases. Cases that were truly gut-wrenching. But standing up for those kids, being their voice for justi...
Human beings have an extraordinary capacity to imagine possibilities and then turn those possibilities into realities. Evident in the gifts of civilization—in our arts, languages, sciences, technologies, businesses, governments, and so on—it is c...
