I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free.

There is only one woman in the world. One woman, with many faces.

A person needs a little madness, or else they never dare cut the rope and be free.

Every perfect traveler always creates the country where he travels.

Beauty is merciless. You do not look at it, it looks at you and does not forgive.

I said to the almond tree, "Friend, speak to me of God," and the almond tree blossomed.

I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free.

I expect nothing. I fear no one. I am free.

The real meaning of enlightenment is to gaze with undimmed eyes on all darkness.

My entire soul is a cry, and all my work is a commentary on that cry.

Since we cannot change reality, let us change the eyes which see reality.

In order to succeed, we must first believe that we can.

Everything in this world has a hidden meaning.

A weak soul does not have the endurance to resist the flesh for very long. It grows heavy, becomes flesh itself, and the contest ends. But among responsible men, men who keep their eyes riveted day and night upon the Supreme Duty, the conflict between flesh and spirit breaks out mercilessly and may last until death.

All my life, I struggled to stretch my mind to the breaking point, until it began to creak, in order to create a great thought which might be able to give a new meaning to life, a new meaning to death, and to console mankind.

Behind each woman rises the austere, sacred and mysterious face of Aphrodite.

God hates a half-devil ten times more than an arch-devil!

Happiness is a simple everyday miracle, like water, and we are not aware of it.

I fight to embrace the entire circle of human activity to the full extent of my ability.

I knew that no matter what door you knock on in a Cretan village, it will be opened for you. A meal will be served in your honor, and you will sleep between the best sheets in the house. In Crete, the stranger is still the unknown god. Before him, all doors and all hearts are opened.

I said to the almond tree, 'Friend, speak to me of God,' and the almond tree blossomed.

Let your youth have free reign. It won't come again, so be bold, and no repenting.

Life is trouble. Only death is not. To be alive is to unfasten your belt and look for a fight.

May God forgive me, but the letters of the alphabet frighten me terribly. They are sly, shameless demons - and dangerous! You open the inkwell, release them; they run off - and how will you ever get control of them again!

My principal anguish, and the wellspring of all my joys and sorrows, has been the incessant merciless battle between the spirit and the flesh.

One of man's greatest obligations is anger.

The human soul is heavy, clumsy, held in the mud of the flesh. Its perceptions are still coarse and brutish. It can divine nothing clearly, nothing with certainty.

The masses do not see the Sirens. They do not hear songs in the air. Blind, deaf, stooping, they pull at their oars in the hold of the earth. But the more select, the captains, harken to a Siren within them... and royally squander their lives with her.

True teachers use themselves as bridges over which they invite their students to cross; then, having facilitated their crossing, joyfully collapse, encouraging them to create bridges of their own.

We come from a dark abyss, we end in a dark abyss, and we call the luminous interval life.

In order to succeed we must first believe that we can.

By believing passionately in something that still does not exist we create it. The nonexistent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired.

Since we cannot change reality let us change the eyes which see reality.

The human soul is heavy clumsy held in the mud of the flesh. Its perceptions are still coarse and brutish. It can divine nothing clearly nothing with certainty.

A person needs a little madness or else they never dare cut the rope and be free.

You can knock on a deaf mans door forever.

In religions which have lost their creative spark the gods eventually become no more than poetic motifs or ornaments for decorating human solitude and walls.

True teachers are those who use themselves as bridges over which they invite their students to cross then having facilitated their crossing joyfully collapse encouraging them to create their own.

The only thing I know is this I am full of wounds and still standing on my feet.

There is no harsher means of punishment than to answer malice with kindness.

Be always restless, unsatisfied, unconforming. Whenever a habit becomes convenient, smash it! The greatest sin of all is satisfaction.

Ideal teachers are those who use themselves as bridges over which they invite their students to cross, then having facilitated their crossing, joyfully collapse, encouraging them to create bridges of their own.

Every word is an adamantine shell which encloses a great explosive force. To discover its meaning you must let it burst inside you like a bomb and in this way liberate the soul which it imprisons.

Boredom is... a vital problem for the moralist, since half the sins of mankind are caused by the fear of it.

People react to fear, not love; they don't teach that in Sunday School, but it's true.

Luck is everything... My good luck in life was to be a really frightened person. I'm fortunate to be a coward, to have a low threshold of fear, because a hero couldn't make a good suspense film.

In fact I have nightmares about having children. I want to carry a baby and feel the life within me and in my dream, I do. But every time after it's born, there's this incredible fear, this pounding pulse of fear. It's a real bad nightmare.

Our society must make it right and possible for old people not to fear the young or be deserted by them, for the test of a civilization is the way that it cares for its helpless members.

Democracy is stronger than terrorism, and we will not cower to the terrorists' campaign of fear.