“But writers experience the world and themselves in a unique way. We look for meaning. We see it even when we are not paying attention, which is seldom because, as writers, paying attention is what we do. We are scribes to the ticking of the days, and we have a job to do. We are not at peace unless we are doing it.”

“What do we do with ourselves when we find we have failed to become the adults we dreamed as pious children?”

“When we live in the love of God, we begin to pay attention to people the way God pays attention to us.”

“We pay attention to what we are told to attend to, or what we're looking for, or what we already know...what we see is amazingly limited.”

“Most of us are one of two things: blind or chicken-shit. We wouldn't know a crossroads in our lives if it had a set of stoplights and a Denny's.”

“We must nurture and love, if life is to have any real meaning. But First we must find a way to survive against the things that prevent us from doing so.”

“If you’ve ever wondered why some writers who, in your humble opinion, don’t write as well as you do yet are rich and famous while you struggle onward, this is the reason. They are great directors.”