The best feelings in your life come when you start feeling good after you've been feeling just awful

An artists job is to see. And to go out in the world and see it firsthand, just as it is; to report with line and words what is seen. To be in the world, not just study about the world, that is the artists task

One of life's best coping mechanisms is to know the difference between an inconvenience and a problem.

You will continue to read stories of crookedness and corruption - of policemen who lie and steal, doctors who reap where they do not sew, politicians on the take. Don't be misled. They are news because they are the exceptions.

If I don't have time to live my life well the first time, when am I going to find the time to go back and live it over?

Public lives are lived out on the job and in the marketplace, where certain rules, conventions, laws, and social customs keep most of us in line. Private lives are lived out in the presence of family, friends, and neighbors who must be considered and respected even though the rules and proscriptions are looser than what's allowed in public. But in our secret lives, inside our own heads, almost anything goes.

Never forget that music is too important to be left entirely in the hands of professionals.