As a child, I didn't know what I didn't have. I'm thankful for the challenges early on in my life because now I have a perspective on the world and kind of know what's important.
When I was about to turn 50, I went into a kind of personal revision and observed my own priorities and what led those priorities in my life. And many things that, in a way, were profound.
For me, writing has always come out of living a fairly to-the-bone kind of life, just really being present to a lot of life. The writing has been really a byproduct of that.
My philosophy towards life is to enjoy it to the fullest and have fun. I am one of those 'laugh-out-loud' kinds. I am quirky, yet witty.
My parents taught me honesty, truth, compassion, kindness and how to care for people. Also, they encouraged me to take risks, to boldly go. They taught me that the greatest danger in life is not taking the adventure.
You can't imagine parlor ballads drifting out of high-rise multi-towered buildings. That kind of music existed in a more timeless state of life.
Despite fearful rhetoric to the contrary, terrorism is not a transcendent threat. A terrorist attack cannot possibly destroy our country's way of life; it's only our reaction to that attack that can do that kind of damage.
When you have had the kind of fame I had, I was always hounded by the media and I lived a very isolated life. Now it's even more difficult. The world has changed dramatically.
All of my books come from something that I happen to be working out at a given point in my life. It's kind of self-therapy.
If you like trekking, go to the Himalayas or Peru. I love those kinds of trips. But it all depends on your own life and what you like and what you expect.
I don't think you need any kind of backing here in the industry. I think what you achieve in your life is the result of your own talent and hard work.
'Brooklyn's Finest,' this is the kind of movie that's why I want to be an actor, to tell real-life stories. This is where I feel my job is, to interpret life.
You care enough, that you want your life to be fulfilled in a living way, not in a painting way, not in a writing way... you really do want it to be involving in living, corresponding with other living objects, moving, changing, that kind of thing.
I do reread, kind of obsessively, partly for the surprise of how the same book reads at a different point in life, and partly to have the sense of returning to an old friend.
In Afghanistan, life is so fragile; who knows what the next week will bring? That fragility really affects the way you're able to report, and the kind of stories people will tell you.
Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life. Make the most of yourself by fanning the tiny, inner sparks of possibility into flames of achievement.
Everything has to have some kind of a point for people to breathe easy. What's the point of life? I have no clue, but sometimes there are things that just attract us and pull us in a certain way.
We are all the foolishness and all the crimes we did. We're also all the kindnesses we did. I hate to think of life as if we understood time. We don't understand time.
At the center of the religious life is a peculiar kind of joy, the prospect of a happy ending that blossoms from necessarily painful ordeals, the promise of human difficulties embraced and overcome.
I feel like in an interview situation, it's a kind of intimacy that I can understand and handle - versus in real life, when I'm much more of a bumbler and have a hard time.
I was really glad to meet Jane Clark because it did give me an insight. I couldn't imagine what kind of woman she was. I was hugely impressed by her energy, straightforward nature and enthusiasm for life.
