I heard the voice of Jesus say
As a writer I'm essentially just trying to impersonate a first-time reader, who picks up the story and has to decide, at every point, whether to keep going.
What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness.
Don't be afraid to be confused. Try to remain permanently confused. Anything is possible. Stay open, forever, so open it hurts, and then open up some more, until the day you die, world without end, amen.
I think it is time for a new pride in the intellectual life, and a new impatience with people who take pride in ignorance, or somehow use "elite" to mean "person who has taken the time to know" and then are eager to dismiss, say, striving, or the notion that improving one's self out of difficult conditions is a noble thing.
The thing I've discovered that is a help is that there isn't a simple virtue or a simple vice. They're always connected. If you have Tendency A, that you loathe, you can almost be sure that Tendency B, which you love, is somehow connected to it.
What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness. Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded. . . sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly.
Forbid it Lord that I should boast, save in the death of Christ, my God: All the vain things that charm me most, I sacrifice them to his blood.
We simply don't know yet what's going to happen to the carbon in the atmosphere.
Economic crimes are complex in nature, difficult to untangle, and they must be investigated according to the procedures set by the law.
Writers - we're a little crazy about how much we care about it. We spend a lot of time fussing. At least, I do.