It is not possible to control the outside of yourself until you have mastered your breathing space. It is not possible to change anything until you understand the substance you wish to change.

There's so little wonder left in the world because we've seen everything one way or another'.

I believe you have to write every day–make the time. It’s about having an organized mind instead of a chaotic and untidy one. There is a myth that writers are bohemian and do what they like in their own way. Real writers are the most organized people on the planet. You have to be. You’re doing the work and running your own business as well. It’s an incredibly organized state. [Also reading]…one of the things reading does do is discipline your mind. There are no writers who are not readers.

Know thyself,’ said Socrates. Know thyself,’ said Sappho, ‘and make sure that the Church never finds out.

If we make anything that lasts, it outlives us.

After every ''victory'' you have more enemies.

Reading things that are relevant to the facts of your life is of limited value. The facts are, after all, only the facts, and the yearning passionate part of you will not be met there. That is why reading ourselves as a fiction as well as fact is so liberating. The wider we read the freer we become.