"Madonna remains the most visible performer on the planet, as well as one of the wealthiest, but would anyone seriously say that artistic self-development is her primary motivating principle? She is too busy with Kabbalah, fashion merchandising, adoption melodramas, the gym, and ill-starred horseback riding to study art."

"My generation of bossy, confident, baby-boom women were something brand new in history. Our energy and assertiveness weren't created by Betty Friedan, unknown before her 1963 book, or by Gloria Steinem, whose political activism, as even the Lifetime profile admitted, did not begin until 1969."

"High Romanticism shows you nature in all its harsh and lovely metamorphoses. Flood, fire and quake fling us back to the primal struggle for survival and reveal our gross dependency on mammoth, still mysterious forces."

"American policy seems to be wed to a perpetual state of war. Why? History shows that the world will always be in flux or turmoil, with different peoples competing for visibility and power. The U.S. cannot fix the fate of every nation."

"Wisdom principle 73 tells us that the journey of life is lesson 72."

"Let thoughts come and go like clouds across an undisturbed autumn sky. Remember this in moments of decisive trial — an essential principle for the reflective life."

"Wisdom principle 69 tells us that the journey of life is lesson 20."

"It is a profound truth that we do not remember the passing of hours, but the resonance of moments — an essential principle for the reflective life."