Because that was the problem, really, wasn’t it, with being human? You couldn’t just be, couldn’t just live and exist without dragging your feet through the mud. You had to communicate, congregate, collaborate, cohabiate. You had to corroborate...
And often the worst thing wasn't the victims--they were dead, after all, and beyond any more pain. The worst thing was those who loved them and survived them. Often the walking dead from now on, shell-shocked, hearts ruptured, stumbling through the r...
At last I understood that the way over, or through this dilemma, the unease at writing about 'petty personal problems' was to recognize that nothing is personal, in the sense that it is uniquely one's own. Writing about oneself, one is writing about ...
After I had been studying with him for two years, Schoenberg said, "In order to write music, you must have a feeling for harmony." I explained to him that I had no feeling for harmony. He then said that I would always encounter an obstacle, that it w...
Pain is a predator when we run from it, it will inevitably chase us down and catch us in its clutches. The goal isn't to wallow in the pain or to avoid it, but rather, to move through it. Pain only holds us hostage when we get stuck in it or try to r...
Living in the land of, "What if....?" leads to emotional paralysis. It sets the stage for doom and gloom thinking. It prevents us from experiencing the beauty of the present moment. Happiness resides in the here and now. It can not thrive in a prison...
You’ll pass through highs and lows in life, and somehow, somewhere, you’ll lose the urge to call him up everytime something good or bad happens. For every song that reminds you of him, you’ll find five new ones that remind you of something bett...
Life is filled with either problems or possibilities. When you look at a problem, but see opportunity instead, you become a powerful source that transforms grief into greatness. Don’t be someone who goes through greater lengths to avoid change than...
You can accomplish almost anything when you’re trying to accomplish what you care about. Wear yourself out with focused, disciplined work on a purpose that connects with who you truly are. You have a unique voice and a unique drive that are longing...
Nothing is more important to human beings than an ecologically functioning, life sustaining biosphere on the earth. It is the only habitable place we know of in a forbidding universe. We all depend on it to live and we are compelled to share it; it i...
In that most burdensome moment of all human history, with blood appearing at every pore and an anguished cry upon His lips, Christ sought Him whom He had always sought—His Father. “Abba,” He cried, “Papa,” or from the lips of a younger chil...
Life's more important than a living. So many people who make a living are making death, not life. Don't ever join them. They're the gravediggers of our civilization - The safe men. The compromisers. The moneymakers. The muddlers-through. Politics is ...
At the top of the page I wrote my full name [...] At the sight of it, many thoughts rushed through me, but I could write down only this: "I wish I could love someone so much that I would die from it." And then as I looked at this sentence a great dea...
Tower Controller at Rancho Conejo: In another couple of minutes, we'll have them in position, Colonel. Col. Wilberforce: In another couple of minutes, men, we'll have you in position. Tower Controller at Rancho Conejo: [Sarcastically] You're doing a ...
Adam: What are your qualifications? Beetlejuice: Ah. Well... I attended Juilliard... I'm a graduate of the Harvard business school. I travel quite extensively. I lived through the Black Plague and had a pretty good time during that. I've seen the EXO...
Robert Frobisher: My dearest Sixsmith, I shot myself through the roof of my mouth this morning with Vivian Ayrs' Luger. A true suicide is a paced, disciplined certainty. People pontificate suicide is a coward's act. Couldn't be further from the truth...
Nicky Santoro: [to Ace] Get this through your head you Jew motherfucker, you! You only exist out here because of me! That's the only reason! Without *me*, you, personally, every fuckin' wise guy skell around'll take a piece of your fuckin' Jew ass! T...
Uncle Lewis: [Clark is cleaning up the garbage off the kitchen floor after the dog went through it] Hey Gris, you're not doing anything constructive. Run into the living room and get my stogey. Clark: Is there anything else I can do for you, Uncle Le...
Peter: Somebody better sit watch all the time. Roger: [points to the boarded up door] They'll never get through there. Peter: Enough of them will. And it's not just those things we have to worry about. That chopper up there could give us away if some...
Tony Wendice: At exactly three minutes to eleven, you'll enter the house through the street door. You'll find the key to this door under the stair carpet here. C.A. Swan: The fifth step? Tony Wendice: That's the one. Go straight to the window, and hi...
John Dunbar: [voice-over] It was hard to know how to feel. I had never been in a battle like this one. This had not been a fight for territory or riches or to make men free. This battle had no ego. It had been fought to preserve the food stores that ...