Why, when we know that there's no such thing as perfect, do most of us spend an incredible amount of time and energy trying to be everything to everyone? Is it that we really admire perfection? No - the truth is that we are actually drawn to people w...
My mum died of leukemia when I was in high school - she lost her life at 40. It was very hard, and I didn't do that much in Chicago after that. I actually sat around and didn't do anything for three years. I didn't know what I wanted to do anymore be...
Like, if you look at Heidi Montag, who got 10 surgeries she didn't need, I think that's unfortunate. I've always been voluptuous with a big butt, but didn't have boobs, so I wanted my body balanced out. My nose was fine in real life, but it didn't ph...
For most people, an hour a day playing our favorite games will power up our ability to engage whole-heartedly with difficult challenges, strengthen our relationships with the people we care about most - while still letting us notice when it's time to...
Some people who've read my story think I had a terrible childhood and that I was neglected or even abused, while others feel that my parents, while certainly flawed, also had truly wonderful qualities. And that's the way it should be, because in real...
People are much more complicated in real life, but my characters are as subtle and nuanced as I can make them. But if you say my characters are too black and white, you've missed the point. Villains are meant to be black-hearted in popular novels. If...
Everybody who is anyone wanted to meet a real life gangster, and here's Joey Gallo hitting the scene. What more could you want with a gangster? He looked the part. They call it gangster chic. He dressed like the 'Reservoir Dogs' - black suit, white s...
For us this is the end of all the stories.... But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world...had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story, which n...
There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: and One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to...
Often we allow ourselves to be upset by small things we should despise and forget. We lose many irreplaceable hours brooding over grievances that, in a year's time, will be forgotten by us and by everybody. No, let us devote our life to worthwhile ac...
(1) Use mathematics as shorthand language, rather than as an engine of inquiry. (2) Keep to them till you have done. (3) Translate into English. (4) Then illustrate by examples that are important in real life (5) Burn the mathematics. (6) If you can�...
Unfortunately, religion often works to shrink and tame the very wild and mysterious forces that first drew our wonder. In the process of making the inexplicable safe for the masses, the possibilities for real illusion-piercing insight becomes reduced...
Because of this false idea, they devised an aesthetic belief in making the exterior of an object a reflection of the practical functions of the interior and of the constructive idea. Yet these analyses of utility and necessity that, according to thei...
Sin is the only real colour-element left in modern life.' 'You really must not say things like that before Dorian, Harry.' 'Before which Dorian? The one who is pouring out tea for us, or the one in the picture?' 'Before either.' 'I should like to com...
Caine: My father sold dope and my mother was a heroin addict. Moms and Pops were real popular in the neighborhood. They would always be giving parties for friends of theirs who just got out of jail or was on their way to jail. They only got married '...
Captain Miller: Get your gear. Let's go. [Reiben stays put] Sergeant Horvath: You heard him, gear up. Your captain just gave you an order. Private Reiben: Yeah, like the one he gave to take this machine gun. That was a real doosey, wasn't it? [walks ...
I have often thought that Walter Mitty had it in him to be more than a hen-pecked loser. Instead of living it up as a flamboyant daredevil in his dreams, he could have chosen to be a responsible man in real life, going about his work with dignity, an...
I wrote in my journal about how good I felt when I was not living under Ed’s control. Then, when I really felt like giving up, I read these pages and realized that I was striving for in recovery was a real possibility. I thought about these experie...
Tis true my garments threadbare are, And sorry poor I seem; But inly I am richer far Than any poet's dream. For I've a hidden life no one Can ever hope to see; A sacred sanctuary none May share with me. Aloof I stand from out the strife, Within my he...
A word of warning here. The events as you remember them will never be the same in your memory once you have turned them into a memoir. For years I have worried that if I turn all of my life into literature, I won't have any real life left - just stor...
She did not respond, only clung harder to my embrace, and I held her with all the afflictions of a man torn by love. What a miracle she was, what a truly exquisite paragon of beauty and virtue so incredibly combined. And all perhaps wrenched from my ...
