“Let's be honest, your occupation is boring. It's great if you like it. It's great if you pretend to like it. It's really great if you work good hours and make good money. But I don't need to hear about it.”

“That's life you know? It is all one big waiting room. Sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad. And then, like you, sometimes it's great.”

“It's not how great the ideas are. It's about how you write them, to make them great.”

“Everybody's got the potential for great good and great wrong in them, but it's thechoices we make that define who we really are.”

“Ben: You know what's really great about baseball? Lindsey Meeks: Hmm? Ben: You can't fake it. You know, anything else in life you don't have to be great in - business, music, art - I mean you can get lucky. Lindsey Meeks: Really? Ben: Yeah, you can fool everyone for awhile, you know? It's like - not - not baseball. You can either hit a curveball or you can't. That's the way it works... Lindsey Meeks: Hmm. Ben: You know? Ben: You can have a lucky day, sure, but you can't have a lucky career. It's a little like math. It's orderly. Win or lose, it's fair. It all adds up. It's, like, not as confusing or as ambiguous as, uh... Lindsey Meeks: Life? Ben: Yeah. It's - it's safe.”

“Here's the truth about telling stories with your life. It's going to sound like a great idea, and you're going to get excited about it, and then when it comes time to do the work, you're not going to want to do it. It's like that with writing books, and it's like that with life. People love to have lived a great story, but few people like the work it takes to make it happen. But joy costs pain.”