Many people die with their music still in them. Why is this so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it, time runs out.

I'm so sorry for you; your lives have been so easy. You can't play great music unless your heart's been broken.

The way to really live is to die. The passport to living is to imagine yourself in your grave. Imagine you’re lying in your coffin….Now look at your problems from that viewpoint. Changes everything, doesn’t it?"

Musicians must make music, artists must paint, poets must write if they are to be ultimately at peace with themselves. What human beings can be, they must be. They must be true to their own nature. This need we may call self-actualization.

Why don't I see goodness and beauty everywhere? Because you cannot see outside of you what you fail to see inside.

Everything passes, everything.

…As the great Confucius said, “The one who would be in constant happiness must frequently change.” Flow. But we keep looking back, don’t we? We cling to things in the past and cling to things in the present...Do you want to enjoy a symphony? Don’t hold on to a few bars of the music. Don’t hold on to a couple of notes. Let them pass, let them flow. The whole enjoyment of a symphony lies in your readiness to allow the notes to pass...

Perfect love casts out fear. Where there is love there are no demands, no expectations, no dependency. I do not demand that you make me happy; my happiness does not lie in you. If you were to leave me, I will not feel sorry for myself; I enjoy your company immensely, but I do not cling.

You’re not living until it doesn’t matter a tinker’s damn to you whether you live or die. At that point you live. When you’re ready to lose your life, you live it.

Life is for the gambler, it really is.

Suffering is given to you that you might open your eyes to the truth.

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