You can die from someone else's misery — emotional states are as infectious as diseases. You may feel you are helping the drowning man but you are precipitating your own disaster. The unfortunate sometimes draw misfortune on themselves; they will also draw it on you. Associate with the happy and fortunate instead.

Never waste valuable time, or mental peace of mind, on the affairs of others—that is too high a price to pay.

The ideas get under your skin. I am honored and deeply excited by the thought that the next generation of writers, or whomever, are influenced by these books.

There's a real tension between it being a collaborative art process, which is almost like performance art of yourself, and, as we talk about the movie, it's kind of a mix between melodrama and cinéma vérité. This involves ideas about playing the role of yourself and the movie of your life and all these other things.

When our emotions are engaged, we often have trouble seeing things as they are.

If you're just letting the time pass at your job, it's just dead time and you'll never get it back. If at that job you're learning and you're observing and you're seeing about people and connections, it's suddenly alive time.

The moment people feel they know what to expect from you, your spell on them is broken.