“A good way to rid one's self of a sense of discomfort is to do something. That uneasy, dissatisfied feeling is actual force vibrating out of order; it may be turned to practical account by giving proper expression to its creative character.”

“The proper thing to do is to admit that hell is real and to allow our feelings of discomfort to motivate us to action.”

“Librarians, too, are gatekeepers -- not of actual experience, of course, but of its written accounts. My job is to safeguard those accounts. Not to judge them; simply to see to their proper dissemination.”

“Meditation is when you sit down, let's say that, and don't do anything. Poetry is when you get up and do something.Somewhere we've developed the misconception that poetry is self-expression, and that meditation is going inward. Actually, poetry has nothing to do with self-expression, it is the way to be free, finally, of self-expression, to go much deeper than that. And meditation is not a form of thought or reflection, it is a looking at or an awareness of what is there, equally inside and outside, and then it doesn't make sense anymore to mention inside or outside.”

“It is said that those who are critical feel the most self-hate. It follows then that those who practice giving praise and appreciation feel good about themselves.”

“She was trying to force her theory to make sense, but there were some annoying knobbly facts getting in the way. She had the uneasy feeling that she was thumping mismatched jigsaw pieces together to make them fit.”