It is easy to forget how full the world is of people, full to bursting, and each of them imaginable and consistently misimagined.

there is no best and no worst, ...those judgments have no real meaning because there is only what is

Without pain, we couldn't know joy.

Everything that comes together falls apart. Everything. The chair I’m sitting on. It was built, and so it will fall apart. I’m gonna fall apart, probably before this chair. And you’re gonna fall apart. The cells and organs and systems that make you you—they came together, grew together, and so must fall apart. The Buddha knew one thing science didn’t prove for millennia after his death: Entropy increases. Things fall apart.

Dear Teens at Starbucks wearing 'Abstain from Sex 2 Attain Ur Goals' t-shirts: Doesn't it depend on what my goals are?

Teenagers are extremely funny, and extremely clever and intellectually curious. But they're also willing to ask questions about the meaning of life without disguising them around irony, and ask questions about what are our responsibilities to other people without having to couch it in irony.

Whenever I'm asked what advice I have for young writers, I always say that the first thing is to read, and to read a lot. The second thing is to write. And the third thing, which I think is absolutely vital, is to tell stories and listen closely to the stories you're being told.