i really didn't have much to teach • i didn't even believe in it • i felt so strongly that everybody had to find their own way • and nobody can teach you your own way... in terms of art, the only real answer that I know of is to do it • if you don't do it, you don't know what happens next.

what is your greatest regret?
having wasted nine perfectly good years in school.

sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.

if you cannot be a poet, be the poem

if you love it enough, anything will talk to you

pain is inevitable • suffering is optional

may those who
love us, love us
and those that
don't love us,
may God turn
their hearts;
and if he doesn't
turn their hearts,
may he turn
their ankles
so we'll know them
by their limping

angels fly because they take themselves lightly.

the bible tells us to love our neighbors and also to love our enemies; probably because they are generally the same people.

when hungry, eat your rice; when tired, close your eyes • fools may laugh at me, but wise men know what i mean.

flowers leave some of their fragrance in the hand that bestows them.

talk doesn't cook rice.

keep a green tree in your heart and perhaps a singing bird will come. 

spiritual awakening is frequently described as a journey to the top of a mountain • we leave our attachments and our worldliness behind and slowly make our way to the top • at the peak we have transcended all the pain... in the process of discovering our true nature, the journey goes down, not up... instead of transcending the suffering of all creatures, we move toward the turbulence and doubt... we explore the reality and unpredictability of insecurity and pain, and we try not to push it away • if it takes years, if it takes lifetimes, we will let it be as it is • at our own pace, without speed or agression, we move down and down and down... at the bottom we discover water, the healing water of compassion • right down there in the thick of things, we discover the love that will not die.

compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded • it's a relationship between equals • only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others • compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.

he who dies with the most toys is still dead.

decency is up a point and kindness is making a rally.

eighty years old! no eyes left, no ears, no teeth, no legs, no wind! and when all is said and done, how astonishingly well one does without them!

in genetic terms all human beings, regardless of race, are more than 99.9 percent the same • modern science has confirmed what we first learned from ancient faiths • the most important fact of life on this earth is our common humanity.

leonard cohen

ring the bells that still can ring.
forget your perfect offering.
there is a crack in everything,
that's how the light gets in.

if you don't become the ocean, you'll be seasick every day.

advice is like snow; the softer it falls the longer it dwells upon, and the deeper it sinks into the mind.

i don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.

hatred bounces

you and i can never be born enough • we are human beings for whom birth is a supremely welcome mystery • the mystery of growing...happens only whenever we are faithful to ourselves