I think there's something about a writer's disposition, that is, even if unaware, always slightly in a witness state.

I don't want to lean back into the past, or forward into the future. I don't want to wish the present moment away. The truth is in the present moment. The great paradox is that when I'm really able to do that, time slows down and opens up. Time feels suddenly and inexplicably without end.

When I sit down with my notebook, when I start scribbling words across the page, I find out what I’m feeling.

Success is so fleeting, even if you get a good book deal or your book is a huge success, there's always the fear: What about the next one?

Everything you need to know about life can be learned from a genuine and ongoing attempt to write

We can't protect ourselves from pain and heartache. In fact, to love - fully, madly, deeply - is the ensure heartache some day.

When I lived in the city, I had learned to close my door against a lot of the noise, but when I open my door here, I'm not opening into the possibility that I'm going to run into somebody or be faced with a hundred choices about what I'm going to do, or which cafe I'm going to go to, or which way to distract myself.