Everybody is original, if he tells the truth, if he speaks from himself. But it must be from his *true* self and not from the self he thinks he *should* be.

You must become aware of the richness in you and come to believe in it and know it is there, so that you can write opulently and with self-trust. If you once become aware of it and have faith in it, you will be all right.

When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold and expand. Ideas actually begin to grow within us and come to life.

it is when you are really living in the present-working, thinking, lost, absorbed in something you care about very much, that you are living spiritually.

You can write anything you want to,--a six-act blank verse, symbolic tragedy or a vulgar short, short story. Just so that you write it with honesty and gusto, and do not try to make somebody believe that you are smarter than you are. What's the use? You can never be smarter than you are.

Don't always be appraising yourself, wondering if you are better or worse than other writers. "I will not Reason and Compare," said Blake; "my business is to Create." Besides, since you are like no other being ever created since the beginning of Time, you are incomparable.

Inspiration does not come like a blot, nor is it kinetic energy striving, but it comes to us slowly and quietly all the time.