'Wonka' was an unforgettable experience. When I first saw the set, it was like walking into a theme park, and most of it was edible.

The best way to learn how to work with actors is to have had experience of trying to act yourself - it will teach you humility if nothing else.

You can't get a job without experience and you can't get experience until you have a job. Once you solve that problem you are home free.

The biggest kick I get is to communicate with those who are exiled from the game - in hospitals, homes, prisons - those who have seldom seen a game, who can't travel to a game, those who are blind.

You don't cheat anybody out of their experience, whatever it is.

Nothing can substitute for just plain hard work. I had to put in the time to get back. And it was a grind. It meant training and sweating every day. But I was completely committed to working out to prove to myself that I still could do it.

I believe that the 'dark night of the soul' is a common spiritual experience. I believe, too, that the answer is continued seeking and perseverance. It helps to know that others have endured a loss of faith.

In limits, there is freedom. Creativity thrives within structure. Creating safe havens where our children are allowed to dream, play, make a mess and, yes, clean it up, we teach them respect for themselves and others.

A God Jar is anything you wish it to be, in which you can put your wishes, dreams, problems, prayers. You may want to think of it as a spiritual mailbox.

Technology teaches passivity. Absorbed in our devices - at any age - we are absorbed in someone else's perspective.

Each of us has an inner dream that we can unfold if we will just have the courage to admit what it is. And the faith to trust our own admission. The admitting is often very difficult.

So much of our mythology around money centers on the illusion that if we had 'more,' we would be more comfortable and more able to access our creativity. But creativity and prosperity are spiritual matters, not fiscal ones.

I think that 'Floor Sample' is a story of resiliency, a lifelong spiritual search, and a lifelong sense of spiritual companionship that is most often expressed as creativity. My desire in writing the book was to step from behind the icon of 'Julia the teacher' and introduce 'Julia the artist.'

Creativity is always a leap of faith. You're faced with a blank page, blank easel, or an empty stage.

Art used to be made in the name of faith. We made cathedrals, we made stained-glass windows, we made murals.

Faith is almost the bottom line of creativity; it requires a leap of faith any time we undertake a creative endeavor, whether this is going to the easel, or the page, or onto the stage - or for that matter, in a homelier way, picking out the right fabric for the kitchen curtains, which is also a creative act.

Every moment is an experience.

I'm not really into religion, OK. I saw a lot of things I did not like when I got into organized religion. I think a lot of people abuse it, I think a lot of people use it, I think a lot of people make it what they want. And me, my faith and my relationship with God is very personal. And it's not anybody's damn business how we talk.

It's the sad thing about entertainment: it's not always about who is the best. Jake The Snake had a horrible time playing politics. I never had a belt; didn't need one. They tried to put me against Hogan twice, but when the people chanted for me, when they chanted for the DDT, that was the end of that. They couldn't ruin their marketing.

It's the sad thing about entertainment, it's not always about who is the best.

When you grow up, you gain experience and realise what youre capable of.

Explorers have to be ready to die lost.

Experience has taught me, when I am shaving of a morning, to keep watch over my thoughts, because, if a line of poetry strays into my memory, my skin bristles so that the razor ceases to act.

Great literature should do some good to the reader: must quicken his perception though dull, and sharpen his discrimination though blunt, and mellow the rawness of his personal opinions.

Even when poetry has a meaning, as it usually has, it may be inadvisable to draw it out... Perfect understanding will sometimes almost extinguish pleasure.

If a line of poetry strays into my memory, my skin bristles so that the razor ceases to act.

There is something discordant about a team of speechwriters and political operatives hammering away to create an image of the 'real, inner' candidate. And, to be blunt, there is no necessary connection between a moving life experience and the skills necessary for leadership.

There are good people who are dealt a bad hand by fate, and bad people who live long, comfortable, privileged lives. A small twist of fate can save or end a life; random chance is a permanent, powerful player in each of our lives, and in human history as well.

When Al Gore picked Joe Lieberman, it was a clear declaration of independence from President Clinton; no Democrat had been more critical of Clinton's misconduct.

If the court strikes down the Defense of Marriage Act, is that a 'liberal' result enabling gay couples married in states where gay marriage is legal to enjoy the same economic advantages that federal laws now grant to straight couples? Or is it a 'conservative' ruling, limiting the federal government's ability to override state power?

Our wisdom comes from our experience, and our experience comes from our foolishness.

The secret of a good marriage is forgiving your partner for marrying you in the first place.

When a man steals your wife, there is no better revenge than to let him keep her.

An ideal wife is one who remains faithful to you but tries to be just as charming as if she weren't.

Bitter experience has taught us how fundamental our values are and how great the mission they represent.

Our society is the product of several great religious and philosophical traditions. The ideas of the Greeks and Romans, Christianity, Judaism, humanism and the Enlightenment have made us who we are.

Good questions outrank easy answers.

Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not: nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not: the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.

Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.

Now, we occupy a lowly position, both in space and rank in comparison with the heavenly sphere, and the Almighty is Most High not in space, but with respect to absolute existence, greatness and power.

If men possessed wisdom, which stands in the same relation to the form of man as the sight to the eye, they would not cause any injury to themselves or to others; for the knowledge of truth removes hatred and quarrels, and prevents mutual injuries.

All the great evils which men cause to each other because of certain intentions, desires, opinions, or religious principles, are likewise due to non-existence, because they originate in ignorance, which is absence of wisdom.

The risk of a wrong decision is preferable to the terror of indecision.

No disease that can be treated by diet should be treated with any other means.

It is necessary to bear in mind that Scripture only teaches the chief points of those true principles which lead to the true perfection of man, and only demands in general terms faith in them.

You will certainly not doubt the necessity of studying astronomy and physics, if you are desirous of comprehending the relation between the world and Providence as it is in reality, and not according to imagination.

The best education I have ever received was through travel.

Coming from an Asian culture, I was always taught to respect my elders, to be a better listener than a talker.

The city of Oia is the most magnificently romantic place I've ever been.