“Even the air seemed on fire, subtly aflame with energy as it does when you are young, when the synapses are firing wildly and death is far away.”

“The ear participates, and helps arrange marriages;the eye has already made love with what it sees.The eye knows pleasure, delights in the body's shape:the ear hears words that talk about all this.When hearing takes place, character areas change;but when you see, inner areas change.If all you know about fire is what you have heardsee if the fire will agree to cook you!Certain energies come only when you burn.If you long for belief, sit down in the fire!When the ear receives subtly; it turns into an eye.But if words do not reach the ear in the chest, nothing happens.”

“When a forest grows too wild a purging fire is inevitable and natural...”

“Every part of me pulses with electric energy. Every synapse is firing, every part of me is alert, awake, and what I think is that this, this feeling, this is real. This feeling of being absolutely alive, absolutely in this moment, this is as real as it gets.”

“It is cold at six-forty in the morning on a March day in Paris, and seems even colder when a man is about to be executed by firing squad.”

“When we feel weak, we drop our heads on the shoulders of others. Don't get mad when someone does that. Be honored. For that person trusted you enough to, even if subtly, ask you for help.”