We have that illusion that we are 'deciding' what to make a character do, in order to 'convey our message' or something like that. But, at least in my experience, you are often more like a river-rafting guide who's been paid a bonus to purposely steer your clients into the roughest possible water.

...smile first, then speak.

You can see a whole book as a series of creating an expectation and then delivering a skew on that expectation so it's not totally satisfied.

If you haven't read you don't have the voice. The lack of voice eliminates experience.

My heart goes out to him. Sort of. Because empathy depends on how you've spent your day.

Do those things that incline you toward the big questions, and avoid the things that would reduce you and make you trivial.

I tend to foster drama via bleakness. If I want the reader to feel sympathy for a character, I cleave the character in half, on his birthday. And then it starts raining. And he's made of sugar.