I get whatever placidity I have from my father. But my mother taught me how to take it on the chin.

I have three daughters so I can't be as tough as I want to be. When you have kids - especially daughters - they know how to work you. They're a lot smarter than we are that's for sure. But I'll be more tough on their boyfriends.

Since the nature of people is bad to become corrected they must be taught by teachers and to be orderly they must acquire ritual and moral principles.

There is no doubt that religion had already waned under the onslaught of the Enlightenment but it was Freud who provided the radically new understanding of human nature that made any religious explanation of the whats and whys of our personhood seem naive.

I believe that laughter is the best emotional Band-Aid in the world. It's like nature's Neosporin.

Caught up in life you see it badly. You suffer from it or enjoy it too much. The artist in my opinion is a monstrosity something outside of nature.

My illness has taught me something about the nature of humanity love brotherhood and relationships that I never understood and probably never would have. So from that standpoint there is some truth and good in everything.

Economic medicine that was previously meted out by the cupful has recently been dispensed by the barrel. These once unthinkable dosages will almost certainly bring on unwelcome after-effects. Their precise nature is anyone's guess though one likely consequence is an onslaught of inflation.

I get caught up in my bubble of reading writing or music.

I didn't think it was fair to my music to label me as the daughter of somebody - I didn't think it described me very well and I didn't think it had anything to do with my music.

I've been told the weirdest things: 'Yeah I love taking a bath to your music!' or 'I gave birth to my daughter while listening to your music.'

Hunting fishing drawing and music occupied my every moment. Cares I knew not and cared naught about them.

Country music is still your grandpa's music but it's also your daughter's music. It's getting bigger and better all the time and I'm glad to be a part of it.

I was irrevocably betrothed to laughter the sound of which has always seemed to me the most civilised music in the world.

The trouble with music appreciation in general is that people are taught to have too much respect for music they should be taught to love it instead.

Music makes us want to live. You don't know how many times people have told me that they'd been down and depressed and just wanted to die. But then a special song caught their ear and that helped give them renewed strength. That's the power music has.

Close friends contribute to our personal growth. They also contribute to our personal pleasure making the music sound sweeter the wine taste richer the laughter ring louder because they are there.