Being yourself is not remaining what you were, or being satisfied with what you are. It is the point of departure and far from the goal.

As WArden Lawes once said of convicts, no man can be called a failure until he has tried something he really likes, and fails at it.

What is much harder to handle is the sense that you have to live up to the mark someone else has set for you. The grades become too important, the competition too frantic, the fear of disappointing those who believe in you turns into an overwhelming nightmare.

Norbert Blei is a writer the way people used to be troubadours and minstrels, celebrating what he has seen and heart and felt in a deceptively simple style reminiscent of the early Sherwood Anderson. . . . Like Anderson, he is a lover, and his affection invests his writing with a singular charm.

There's no point in burying a hatchet if you're going to put up a marker on the site.

All significant achievement comes from daring from experiment from the willingness to risk failure.

When you run into someone who is disagreeable to others, you may be sure he is uncomfortable with himself; the amount of pain we inflict upon others is directly proportional to the amount we feel within us.