Disconnecting from change does not recapture the past. It loses the future.

Any life lived attentively is disillusioning as it forces us to know us as we are.

Acedia is a danger to anyone whose work requires great concentration and discipline yet is considered by many to be of little practical value. The world doesn't care if I write another word, and if I am to care, I have to summon all my interior motivation and strength.

But hope has an astonishing resilience and strength. Its very persistence in our hearts indicates that it is not a tonic for wishful thinkers but the ground on which realists stand.

I've come to see conspiracy theories as the refuge of those who have lost their natural curiosity and ability to cope with change.

Just the knowledge that a good book is waiting one at the end of a long day makes that day happier.

In middle age we are apt to reach the horrifying conclusion that all sorrow, all pain, all passionate regret and loss and bitter disillusionment are self-made