“Assume a virtue, if you have it not. That monster, custom, who all sense doth eat, Of habits devil, is angel yet in this, That to the use of actions fair and good He likewise gives a frock or livery That aptly is put on. Refrain tonight, And that shall lend a kind of easiness To the next abstinence; the next more easy; For use almost can change the stamp of nature.”

“Refrain to-night;And that shall lend a kind of easinessTo the next abstinence, the next more easy;For use almost can change the stamp of nature,And either master the devil or throw him outWith wondrous potency.”

“The goal is something like personal sustainability. I hate to use that word, but it's the one that makes the most sense. Eat what you can eat without getting fat. It's easy to do that once you've unlocked the secrets of how your body uses what you put into it.”

“Change might not be fast and it isn't always easy. But with time and effort, almost any habit can be reshaped.”

“Never worry about the reader, what the reader can understand. When you are writing, glance over your shoulder, and you’ll find there is no reader. Just you and the page. Feel lonely? Good! Assuming you can write clear English (or Norwegian) sentences, give up all worry about communication. If you want to communicate, use the telephone. To write a poem you have to have a streak of arrogance (…) when you are writing you must assume that the next thing you put down belongs not for reasons of logic, good sense, or narrative development, but because you put it there. You, the same person who said that, also said this. The adhesive force is your way of writing, not sensible connection.”

“Eating next to a twenty-foot-long crocodile took some getting used to, but Philip was well trained. He only ate bacon, stray waterfowl, and the occasional invading monster.”