Thinking in its lower grades, is comparable to paper money, and in its higher forms it is a kind of poetry.

However well organized the foundations of life may be, life must always be full of risks.

If men and women are to understand each other, to enter into each other's nature with mutual sympathy, and to become capable of genuine comradeship, the foundation must be laid in youth.

Man lives by imagination.

Pain and death are part of life. To reject them is to reject life itself.

All the art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on.

Many of our own people here in this country do not ask about computers, telephones and television sets. They ask - when will we get a road to our village.

I don't imagine Heads of Government would ever be able to say I'm not an economist therefore I can't take decisions on matters of the economy; I'm not a soldier I can't take decisions on matters of defence; I'm not an educationist so I can't take decisions about education.

I think that probably the most important thing about our education was that it taught us to question even those things we thought we knew. To say you've got to inquire, you've got to be testing your knowledge all the time in order to be more effective in what you're doing.

The people of Zimbabwe have a responsibility to ensure that the government that they elected behaves properly.

The poor prey on one another because their lives offer no hope and communicate the tragic message to these human beings that they have no possibility to attain a decent standard of living.

'Star Wars' is fun, its exciting, its inspirational, and people respond to that. It's what they want.

All art is dependent on technology because it's a human endeavour, so even when you're using charcoal on a wall or designed the proscenium arch, that's technology.

I was going to go to a four-year college and be an anthropologist or to an art school and be an illustrator when a friend convinced me to learn photography at the University of Southern California. Little did I know it was a school that taught you how to make movies! It had never occurred to me that I'd ever have any interest in filmmaking.

Storytelling is about two things; it's about character and plot.

I was never interested in being powerful or famous. But once I got to film school and learned about movies, I just fell in love with it. I didn't care what kind of movies I made.

You simply have to put one foot in front of the other and keep going. Put blinders on and plow right ahead.

The secret to the movie business, or any business, is to get a good education in a subject besides film - whether it's history, psychology, economics, or architecture - so you have something to make a movie about. All the skill in the world isn't going to help you unless you have something to say.

Before I became a film major, I was very heavily into social science, I had done a lot of sociology, anthropology, and I was playing in what I call social psychology, which is sort of an offshoot of anthropology/sociology - looking at a culture as a living organism, why it does what it does.

I'm not much of a math and science guy. I spent most of my time in school daydreaming and managed to turn it into a living.

The technology keeps moving forward, which makes it easier for the artists to tell their stories and paint the pictures they want.

Digital technology is the same revolution as adding sound to pictures and the same revolution as adding color to pictures. Nothing more and nothing less.

Digital technology allows us a much larger scope to tell stories that were pretty much the grounds of the literary media.

There should be a point to movies. Sure, you're giving people a diversion from the cold world for a bit, but at the same time, you pass on some facts and rules and maybe a little bit of wisdom.

The story being told in 'Star Wars' is a classic one. Every few hundred years, the story is retold because we have a tendency to do the same things over and over again. Power corrupts, and when you're in charge, you start doing things that you think are right, but they're actually not.

Whatever has happened in my quest for innovation has been part of my quest for immaculate reality.

If the boy and girl walk off into the sunset hand-in-hand in the last scene, it adds 10 million to the box office.

The secret to film is that it's an illusion.

I thought Star Wars was too wacky for the general public.

Learning to make films is very easy. Learning what to make films about is very hard.

Football games are on TV, and it doesn't affect stadium attendance at all. It's the same with movies. People who really love movies and like to go out on a Saturday night will go to the movie theater.

The sound and music are 50% of the entertainment in a movie.

Good luck has its storms.

Working hard is very important. You're not going to get anywhere without working extremely hard.

The secret is not to give up hope. It's very hard not to because if you're really doing something worthwhile I think you will be pushed to the brink of hopelessness before you come through the other side.

I was afraid that science-fiction buffs and everybody would say things like, 'You know, there's no sound in outer space.'

You can't do it unless you can imagine it.

One thing about 'Star Wars' that I'm really proud of is that it expands the imagination. That's why I like the 'Star Wars' toys.

I am simply trying to struggle through life; trying to do God's bidding.

The way I define 'intelligent design' is that when people started out, we wanted to make sense of the world we lived in, so we created stories about how things worked.

Getting through high school and college was one of my greatest achievements.

I do not think about being beautiful. What I devote most of my time to is being healthy.

I had no doubts I could go to the pole. I may not be as strong, but I make up for physical strength in other areas, like steadiness and not panicking under stress.

The best way to get most husbands to do something is to suggest that perhaps they're too old to do it.

I'm lucky I had some teachers who saw something in me.

I wanted to be a teacher, but I was a lousy student, one of the slowest readers. It was a tremendous struggle. But I'm lucky I had some teachers who saw something in me.

A life lesson for me is, how do you muster the courage to take on a new risk? Whether it's starting up a business or taking on a new project or expedition. I think the risks that we take are all relative to the risk-taker.

I'm a gay disabled man who has become very successful. I don't get up in the morning and think I'm inspirational; I just get up thinking that I love horses.

I feel lucky that I found my talent, not unlucky that I was born with a disability. When I'm on a horse, I'm more worried about what the riding hat is doing to my hair than what my bent legs and arms are doing. What riding has given me is respect.

When I pull my white Range Rover into disabled parking bays, the abuse that I get until I actually get out on my crutches is phenomenal, because people presume that you couldn't possibly be disabled and reverse a white Range Rover into that parking space.