It's like there's this knowledge hanging in the air that one person has more power than the other, and we're supposed to pretend everything is nice and normal and equal, but in reality, luck or chance has showered benefits on one person that the other person couldn't dream of.

The world will not give you an endowment for your finger-painting. Your finger-painting may be marvelous, but our government and society do not value art adequately. We should fulminate against that and seek to change it, but in the meantime you have to make choices. If you're an artist who likes to have a steady income for yourself, for your children, for your partner, to help you engage in elder care as you take care of your parents or grandparents, that's a good thing.

If you buy my book at Walmart, I don't want you to read it. I want you to set it on fire. Because that's what you just did with your money. When you buy a book through an indie-store, you put some money into an independent store and owner in your community. You've put some money into someone's life and someone's livelihood, into keeping the lights on, into helping them be alive. That's a great thing.

In the short term, it absolutely feels devastating to break a bond of friendship. In the long term, it is the best possible thing. You're actually doing something noble and good if you do it in the right way. You can leave them with, "I wish you the best, but I have to take care of myself." Or you don't have to wish them the best. It's okay if you don't. Maybe they don't deserve the best. That's not up to you to decide. You not wishing someone the best is not going to make anyone's life not the best.

I think that if you want help from somebody, you ask. You ask not expecting anyone to give it to you, unless it is a friend or a loved one with whom you should have those expectations, because friends should help friends. Even so, when I ask friends for blurbs or for endorsements or instructions, I always leave room for the fact that they're probably busy and have a million more things to do in their day than give me Ryan Gosling's phone number. Which I've never asked for, just by way of casual example.

What I really wanted wasn't what I thought I was supposed to want. It wasn't what people had told me I should want or that books and movies and TV had put across. What I really wanted was to be a working artist, which I am.

The biggest strength is being able to have perspective. Get the distance, and it enables you to be able to laugh at yourself.