So many people mentioned this at these rallies. You go to these things and it's kind of like an oldies concert. I mean, it's not hostile.

If I can be more efficient, I'm actually being more respectful to the reader, which then implies a greater intimacy with the reader.

That luminous part of you that exists beyond personality - your soul, if you will - is as bright and shining as any that has ever been. Bright as Shakespeare’s, bright as Gandhi’s, bright as Mother Theresa’s. Clear away everything that keeps you separate from this secret luminous place. Believe it exists, come to know it better, nurture it, share its fruits tirelessly.

Every writer has to find the thing to keep her eye on about which she has strong opinions. That's of course deeply personal, but the nice thing is that it has to do with joy rather than fear. It has to do with you. If you're funny, your method will be to try to be funnier. Which again is empowering I think.

If you at least try to do the things that excite you, it will make you a more expansive and present person - you’ll feel, at the end of your life, that at least you took the shot.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that whatever weirdness was going to be in there, I felt, had to be earned. And it had to be required by the emotional needs of the book.

I've also found that trying to be active with social media changes my moment-to-moment perceptions. Instead of feeling, "What's the deepest version of what's happening here?" I start to feel, "How can I use [or "claim"] this?".