“We only become what we are by the radical and deep-seated refusal of that which others have made of us.”

“We are not exceptional in our beginnings, we become exceptional by refusing to accept the obstacles which destiny has placed before us.”

“Sometimes we become what we see. Sometimes we take what we see and make it the model for what we refuse to become.”

“The only true measure of success is the ratio between what we might have done and what we might have been on the one hand, and the thing we have made and the things we have made of ourselves on the other.”

“What we have not had to decipher, to elucidate by our own efforts, what was clear before we looked at it, is not ours. From ourselves comes only that which we drag forth from the obscurity which lies within us, that which to others is unknown.”

“While we are looking for the antidote or the medicine to cure us, that is, the 'new', which can only be found by plunging deep into the Unknown, we have to go on exploring sex, books, and travel, although we know that they lead us to the abyss, which, as it happens, is the only place where the antidote can be found.”