The situations that have been the biggest wins for me have been because I was forced to think differently.

Remember, the goal is not to raise great kids; it's to raise kids who become great adults.

There are no hopeless situations, sweetheart, only people who have grown hopeless about them. You still have choices you can make.

Knowledge is one thing. We're awash in knowledge. Wisdom is rare. There's a big difference.

Times of calamity and distress have always been producers of the greatest men. The hardest steel is produced from the hottest fire; the brightest star shreds the darkest night.

When I was 19 years old, both of my parents died in the same year; my mom of cancer and my dad in a car accident. Through the next two or three years and a series of bad decisions - all my own, I might add - I ended up literally homeless, before that was even a word. I even slept occasionally under a pier on the Gulf Coast.

No matter how long it takes or how desperately a person battles or denies, the truth always-always-makes itself known.