“I'd be grateful if you'd say anything, true or not, because I ran out of ideas...responsible or irresponsible, true or not, years ago. Stick your stainless steel spoon in this unhappy old man's brains Doctor...and stir.”

“Years ago there was an old man I knew that told me he didn't trust me, because people with beards were hiding from something. I told him, "That's true, I'm hiding from the barber!!”

“I think that true horror is accomplished by slowly getting into your brain. The old way is much more scary.”

“While you are continuing this practice, week after week, year after year, your experience will become deeper and deeper, and your experience will cover everything you do in your everyday life. The most important thing is to forget all gaining ideas, all dualistic ideas. In other words, just practice zazen in a certain posture. Do not think about anything. Just remain on your cushion without expecting anything. Then eventually you will resume your own true nature. That is to say, your own true nature resumes itself.”

“I set out on a narrow way many years ago, hoping I would find true love along the broken road”

“Mattia's voice no longer stirred anything in his stomach, but he was aware of the idea of him and always would be, as the only true benchmark for everything that had come afterward.”