Criticism is painful when it's not done with love.

I have fallen in love with the imagination. And if you fall in love with the imagination, you understand that it is a free spirit. It will go anywhere, and it can do anything.

Womanist is to feminist as purple is to lavender.

The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any.

No person is your friend who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow.

Look closely at the present you are constructing: it should look like the future you are dreaming.

Whenever you are creating beauty around you, you are restoring your own soul.

I don’t need a certain number of friends, just a number of friends I can be certain of.

Every small positive change we make in ourselves repays us in confidence in the future.

In nature, nothing is perfect and everything is perfect. Trees can be contorted, bent in weird ways, and they're still beautiful.

'Thank you' is the best prayer that anyone could say. I say that one a lot. Thank you expresses extreme gratitude, humility, understanding.

Don't be afraid to bite on a giant, learn from the mosquito

A man cannot fully embrace his future…until he first releases his past

When I was at home I was in a better place but travellers must be content.

I feel that if you made your writing too contrived to meet the market, it wouldn't be any good.

You can't be a real country unless you have a beer.

Fantasies are absolutely safe, as long as you never try to make them a reality.

This idea of tying me to Giuliani is quite unique. I know Rudy Giuliani. I like Rudy Giuliani. I worked with him during his administration. But we're completely different people.

The truths of the Bible are never just abstract concepts; they're always related to real people.

You know, people always ask me how I describe my music. First of all I tell them that's their job and then that also one day I hope to have things referred to as Martha Wainwright -esque.