This is what I know about myself. She was all I wanted. And I took her away.

In the photograph by my bed my mother is perpetually smiling on me. I guess I have forgiven us both, although sometimes in the night my dreams will take me back to the sadness, and I have to wake up and forgive us again.

How could I choose someone who would force me to give up my own small reach for meaning? I chose myself, and without consolation.

Every human being on the face of the earth has a steel plate in his head, but if you lie down now and then and get still as you can, it will slide open like elevator doors, letting in all the secret thoughts that have been standing around so patiently, pushing the button for a ride to the top. The real troubles in life happen when those hidden doors stay closed for too long.

The hardest thing on earth is choosing what matters.

Whatever else you do, listen to your Deepest Self. Love Her and be true to Her, speak Her truth, always.

The whole problem with people is they don't know what matters and what doesn't.