Whether you call it Buddhism or another religion, self-discipline, that's important. Self-discipline with awareness of consequences.
I read books. Avidly, ardently! As if my life depended upon it.
I never change, I simply become more myself.
Novels usually evolve out of 'character. ' Characters generate stories, and the shape of a novel is entirely imagined but should have an aesthetic coherence.
Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another's skin, another's voice, another's soul.
How lovely this world is, really: one simply has to look.
Read widely, and without apology. Read what you want to read, not what someone tells you you should read.
Pondering was the highest vocation. . . Pondering was a special kind of thinking. It was not done in the mind, that chilly place, but in the heart, where the real mystery of intelligence - intuition - rather than thought lay catlike and feminine, ready to pounce.
I'd gone from being this art student messing about with music to this girl with a record deal, magazine front covers and all this hype. In many ways, it was everything I ever wanted, but when it happened all I felt was total, paralysing fear.
Politicians and bureaucrats are no different from the rest of us. They will maximize their incentives just like everybody else.
Everything that rises must converge.