If our goal is to be tolerant of people who are different than we are, then we really are aiming quite low. Traffic jams are to be tolerated. People are to be celebrated.

I was what they call a 'highly functional addict.' ... sometimes people who need help look nothing like people who need help.

Don't let yourself become so concerned with raising a good kid that you forget you already have one.

During my drinking decades, I lived like a pig. My room was a hazardous pile of stilettos, tube tops, wine bottles, ashtrays, and old magazines. I valued nothing. Everything that came into my life was disposable: clothes, opportunities, people. My bedroom looked as if my insides had spilled out onto the floor.

I still get very high and very low in life. Daily. But I've finally accepted the fact that sensitive is just how I was made, that I don't have to hide it and I don't have to fix it. I'm not broken.

It is a decision that compassion is more important than fear, than fitting in, than following the crowd.

I think that sometimes quitting is exactly the right thing to do. Quitting something that's not working requires self-awareness and courage.