Floundering around, learning by doing but also by failing, is not only good but inevitable.

People think there's a single solution to complex problems, and the solution is often making an enemy of a group of people - pulling back and rejecting the other.

I keep coming back to the phrase "Dance with the system" - not just march onwards no matter what happens.

If you were disabled in Russia, you had to re-register every year, and it took up to six months to re-register, so people who lost limbs in Afghanistan had to prove that their leg hadn't grown back.

Somewhere like Russia or China, decision-makers have far fewer constraints on acting than in more open systems.

There are always pressures on decision-makers other than just what is right or what is wrong.

Lots of people in the open system are very determined to try and strengthen evidence-based policy.

To be effective at selling ideas, at being a lobbyist, influencing other people, you have to be very sure of yourself.

I see [activists] getting really angry that people won't just do what the evidence tells them, and that's not very helpful. You need to actually think why that is.

There's no point in just hankering for the big trade unions of the 1950s or '60s.

I sound like a church nut, but look at the role of the churches in the civil rights movement in the States. People are brought together in other ways that can become drivers of change.

When it comes to lovedo not eversettle for anythingless than magical.

I don't sit around thinking that I'd like to have another husband only another man would make me think that way.

The mind may be reluctant to think properly when thinking is all it is supposed to do; the task can be as paralysing as having to tell a joke or mimic an accent on demand.

I'm now the Lord of the Brighton Manor.

You have to train smart. There is always a risk of over-training or training beyond what your body is able to recover from, and that leads to injuries.

Only those return to Eternity Who on earth seek out Eternity.

He prefers not to ruin things with any more questions. What it is is what it is.

The young knowledge worker whose job is too small to challenge and test his abilities either leaves or declines rapidly into premature middle age, soured, cynical, unproductive.

I had my coat hangers spayed.

He fouled out in the fourth quarter, and that's when I really started getting points. He was no more at fault than anyone.