Pinochet and Barack Obama both have the same primary goal, and that's to be president and stay president as long as allowed.

There's no excuse to be bored. Sad, yes. Angry, yes. Depressed, yes. Crazy, yes. But there's no excuse for boredom, ever.

I have never been in a natural place and felt that it was a waste of time. I never have. And it's a relief. If I'm walking around a desert or whatever, every second is worthwhile.

It's hard not to get depressed when you pay attention to the world and how strangely and corrupt the people in it sometimes behave.

When I have a day off, I won't spend it at a Hollywood party. I'd rather be at home with paints and a blank canvas.

You should always do the things in life that are both interesting and make you afraid.

Be kind. It's worthwhile to make an effort to learn about other people and figure out what you might have in common with them.

You don't have to make something that people call art. Living is an artistic activity, there is an art to getting through the day.

I think that every person has many, many people inside of them. We change our personality depending on who we are talking to or what situation we are in.

I think every family is dysfunctional, and some manage to control it better than others.

My job as an artist, as I see it, is to understand and in some cases to take on various ways of thinking about people and the world that are different from my own, sometimes radically different.

The soul contains the event that shall befall it for the event is only the actualization of its thoughts and what we pray to ourselves for is always granted.

We’re all tourists, sort of. Life is tourism, sort of. As far as I’m concerned, the dinosaurs still hold the lease on this godforsaken rock.

Waiting is so unusual that many of us can't stand in a queue for 30 seconds without getting out our phones to check for messages or to Google something.

Very early in my childhood I associated poverty, toil, unemployment, drunkenness, cruelty, quarreling, fighting, debts, jail with large families.

A sin takes on a new and real terror when there seems a chance that it is going to be found out.

You must come to Copenhagen to work with us. We like people who can actually perform thought experiments!

If you change your thoughts you can change your actions.

I love Ben Affleck so much. He's an amazing director.

We're all right, you know,' he says quietly. 'You and me. Okay?' My chest aches, and I nod. 'Nothing else is all right.' His whisper tickles my cheek. 'But we are.

One book that has influenced the writer very strongly is Winwood Reade's Martyrdom of Man...It is still an extraordinarily inspiring presentation of human history as one consistent process.