Chaos is a friend of mine.

One must marry one’s feelings to one’s beliefs and ideas. That is probably the only way to achieve a measure of harmony in one’s life.

Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.

The only things worth learning are the things you learn after you know it all.

None of the records I make are ever a deliberate construction – they’re always an expression of who I am at the time and where I am in my life.

Whatever talents I possess may suddenly diminish or suddenly increase. I can with ease become an ordinary fool. I may be one now. But it doesn’t do to upset one’s own vanity.

I don’t need to be vindicated, and I don’t want attention.

Friend, there’s no greater investment in life than in being a people builder. Relationships are more important than our accomplishments.

It doesn’t matter where you are coming from. All that matters is where you are going.

The possession of anything begins in the mind.

Our treasure lies in the beehive of our knowledge. We are perpetually on the way thither, being by nature winged insects and honey gatherers of the mind.

In my later years, I have looked in the mirror each day and found a happy person staring back. Occasionally I wonder why I can be so happy. The answer is that every day of my life I’ve worked only for myself and for the joy that comes from writing and creating. The image in my mirror is not optimistic, but the result of optimal behavior.

If the other person injures you, you may forget the injury; but if you injure him you will always remember.

I’m confident in who I am. I’ve come to a place in my life where I’ve accepted things that are me, as opposed to feeling pressure to explain myself to people around me. That’s just the way I’ve always tried to be. It didn’t change when I became a star.

For most of us, wisdom is acquired in the thicket of experience and usually meets us somewhere along the way if we live long enough. But sooner is better than later.

When granted many years of life, growing old in age is natural, but growing old with grace is a choice. Growing older with grace is possible for all who will set their hearts and minds on the Giver of grace, the Lord Jesus Christ.

It’s hard for anybody who’s been with me not to feel starved for affection when I’m making love to my ideas. Maybe it’s not meant for me to settle down and be married.

Remember happiness doesn’t depend upon who you are or what you have; it depends solely on what you think.

A man lives by believing something: not by debating and arguing about many things.

I’m not a regrets-type person.

Never let your ego get so close to your position that when your position goes, your ego goes with it.

It’s an endless proving of myself, that I really am a musician, that I have something to offer in the room. That women can be musicians, women can be rock stars, women can be more than an objectified idea of a pop star.

I need to keep working on myself for a while.

Some people carry their heart in their head and some carry their head in their heart. The trick is to keep them apart yet working together.

We all self-conscious. I’m just the first to admit it.

People will try to bring you down, but you gotta go up.

Only stupid people are changed by success.

Avoid popularity if you would have peace.

We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our education system.

I think that when you’re making your way up in the music industry, you have all these heroes and the reasons why they are your heroes. As soon as you get into the industry, your guidelines change a little bit. For me, my heroes now are great people first and great artists second.

The human race is a race of cowards; and I am not only marching in that procession but carrying a banner.

I don’t have a problem with ageing – in fact, I embrace that aspect of it. And am able to and obviously am going to be able to quite easily… it doesn’t faze me at all.

The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.

Luck is believing you’re lucky.

When I was four, my mother insisted I get out of the car and find my own way home. Although I got lost, I did find my way home. It taught me the value of independence at an early age.

I don’t care if people I admire criticize me because their opinion is valuable to me.

I thought one should have the attitude of ‚What do you care what other people think!‘

People become attached to their burdens sometimes more than the burdens are attached to them.

My message isn’t perfectly defined. I have, as a human being, fallen to peer pressure.

I could never identify with that word, ‚weak.‘

There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow men. True nobility lies in being superior to your former self.

At one point I learned transcendental meditation. This was 30-something years ago. It took me back to the way that I naturally was as a child growing up way in the country, rarely seeing people. I was in that state of oneness with creation and it was as if I didn’t exist except as a part of everything.

Only those who want everything done for them are bored.

When you are discontent, you always want more, more, more. Your desire can never be satisfied. But when you practice contentment, you can say to yourself, ‚Oh yes – I already have everything that I really need.‘

I’m crazy, but I’m not too crazy.

We are all sentenced to solitary confinement inside our own skins, for life.

Find your voice and inspire others to find theirs.

I was a bit challenged when I was younger to stay on the right path.

I don’t worry about stress. I create it.

I feel like my music has become a lot of things. It’s hard to label the evolution, but I like there to be an evolution. I just like to paint with all different kinds of colors.

Each has his past shut in him like the leaves of a book known to him by his heart, and his friends can only read the title.

I never knew a more presumptuous person than myself. The fact that I say that shows that what I say is true.

Happiness is a how; not a what. A talent, not an object.

The more I grow in popularity, the lonelier it gets. Because you don’t really know me. You just know this part of me. You fell in love with that. But it’s way more intricate than what meets the surface.

Many people identify their sense of self with the problems they have, or think they have.

Get mad, then get over it.

You can say, ‚Well, isn’t it unfortunate that chaos is represented by the feminine‘ – well, it might be unfortunate, but it doesn’t matter, because that is how it’s represented. It’s been represented like that forever. And there are reasons for it. You can’t change it. It’s not possible. This is underneath everything.

I used to get into a lot of fights.

Enemies are so stimulating.

Adopt responsibility for your own well-being, try to put your family together, try to serve your community, try to seek for eternal truth… That’s the sort of thing that can ground you in your life, enough so that you can withstand the difficulty of life.

The older I get, the better I understand that every day is a gift.