To be alive to be able to see to walk ... it's all a miracle. I have adapted the technique of living life from miracle to miracle.

Of course there is no formula for success, except perhaps an unconditional acceptance of life, and what it brings

Most people ask for happiness on condition. Happiness can only be felt if you don't set any condition.

Don't tell me how talented you are. Tell me how hard you work.

Love life and life will love you back. Love people and they will love you back.

To be alive, to able to see, to walk...it's all a miracle. I have adapted the technique of living life from miracle to miracle.

What good are vitamins? Eat a lobster, eat a pound of caviar - live! If you are in love with a beautiful blonde with an empty face and no brains at all, don't be afraid. Marry her! Live!

You cannot play the piano well unless you are singing within you.

Music is not a hobby, not even a passion with me; music is me. I feel what people get out of me is this outlook on life, which comes out in my music. My music is the last expression of all that.

I'm a free person; I feel terribly free. They could put me in chains and I still would be free because my thoughts would be mine - and that's all I want to have.

We only begin to live life when we learn to accept it on its own terms.

My body is precious and not separate from my soul.

I wanted myself. I wouldn't let what was mine be destroyed.

I am inspired to write, and I write to inspire.

A voteless people is a hopeless people.

Fascism accepts the individual only insofar as his interests coincide with the state's.

We should not have to push you to work hard, you should work hard because you want to be a great player.

I was dyslexic, so math and formulas were not necessarily my strong suit.

Why become a second-rate Ravel when you're already a first-rate Gershwin?

It's time for Haitians to have access to health care. It's time to open our borders to the Haitian diaspora, open our markets to the world. It's time to open our country to potential investors.