We forget our health and comfort and notice a pinching shoe. Much of living well is detaching from our boring stories of pain and shifting focus

The single most valuable human trait, the one quality every schoolchild and adult should be taught to nurture, is, quite simply, kindness.

Dull magic is a collection of tricks: great magic should sting.

Each of us is leading a difficult life, and when we meet people we are seeing only a tiny part of the thinnest veneer of their complex, troubled existences. To practise anything other than kindness towards them, to treat them in any way save generously, is to quietly deny their humanity.

Have your cake and eat it... there's no other reason to have a cake

Magic is not inherently anything. It is what you sell it as.

To impress people as much as we would wish, we would first need to successfully adopt each of their value systems