You're not going to learn how to do it until you do it.
Harry Dresden. Saving the world, one act of random destruction at a time.
There's always, always a choice. My options might really, truly suck, but that doesn't mean there isn't a choice.
Whenever you've got a choice, do good, kiddo. It isn't always fun or easy, but in the long run it makes your life better.
The human mind isn't a terribly logical or consistent place. Most people, given the choice to face a hideous or terrifying truth or to conveniently avoid it, choose the convenience and peace of normality. That doesn't make them strong or weak people, or good or bad people. It just makes them people.
Growing up is all about getting hurt. And then getting over it. You hurt. You recover. You move on. Odds are pretty good you're just going to get hurt again. But each time, you learn something.
There's more magic in a baby's first giggle than in any firestorm a wizard can conjure up, and don't let anyone tell you any different.
So here I am walking around with another person inside of me. Though I think I put it better the day we parted when I said there is a third person we have created from the two of us. And I am stalked now by that other entity.
Acting is a mix of luck and choice. I got lucky.
I think evolution should be taught as an accepted principle. I say that also as the daughter of a school teacher, a science teacher, who has instilled in me a respect for science. I think it should be taught in our schools. I won't ever deny that I see the hand of God in this beautiful creation that is earth. But - that is not a part of state policy or a local curriculum in a school district. Science should be taught in science class.
When I look back on the years of excessive self-doubt, I wonder how I was able to make my paintings. In part, I managed to paint because I had a desire, as strong as the desire for food and sex, to push through, to make an image that signified.