The largest part of what we call 'personality' is determined by how we've opted to defend ourselves against anxiety and sadness".

The telephone becomes an instrument of torture in the demonic hands of a beloved who doesn't call.

Our sense of what is valuable will hence be radically distorted if we must perpetually condemn as tedious everything we lack, simply because we lack it.

The problem isn't so much finding good ideas (there is no shortage) as embedding the ones we have into everyday practice.

Being incomprehensible offers unparalleled protection against having nothing to say...but writing with simplicity requires courage, for there is a danger that one will be overlooked, dismissed as simpleminded by those with a tenacious belief that the impassable prose is a hallmark of intelligence.

The greatest difficulty of Travel is that one is forced to take oneself along.

What is fascinating about marriage is why anyone wants to get married.