Gandhi saw how people have to re-think their own individuality before engaging in political activity. Otherwise they're just playing the game that the adversary has set out.

In America, you don't even have proper holidays. It's really one of the most prosperous slave societies in history. People work their asses off all year long and get two weeks off! It's incredible.

The people who encouraged me weren't necessarily writers or readers themselves. They were people who were just pleased to see me devote my life to reading and writing.

I found it really disturbing to see a novelist writing a diatribe about Islam and Muslim radical extremists, blurring the distinction between the two.

The idea that human beings can make history, that is something quite unique to the modern West.

We need to infuse politics with ideas like compassion and empathy, and a sense that we live in an interdependent world.

The asymmetries of power that have shaped relations between the West and the rest of the world also exist in the realm of literary criticism.

Most suffering is human-made and avoidable. It's mostly in your head.

Freedom of speech doesn't guarantee great literature.

In the modern world, nationalism remains a very important force. We delude ourselves into thinking that globalization has made all of that redundant and that everyone just wants to be like America.

I think what's important and extraordinarily practical about Buddhism, is that it offers very concrete methods for people to work with.

Don’t run away from the challenges. You can graciously overcome every challenge. Be strong!

Parents are like shuttles on a loom. They join the threads of the past with threads of the future and leave their own bright patterns as they go.

Some women have the best husbands. Others make the best of the husbands they have.

All you have to do is ask yourselves, who controls the government? And who are the victims of that control?

The sense of repentance is better assurance of pardon than the testimony of an angel.

Don't try to use what you learn from Buddhism to be a Buddhist; use it to be a better whatever-you-al ready-are.

Whining is a form of manipulation. People will give anything to make you shut up.

I just wanna live the moment and just take every moment and embrace it because life is short.

Purpose! Purposes are for animals with a hell of a lot more dignity than the human race! Just hop on that strange torpedo and ride it to wherever it's going.