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"Just because you're sober, don't think you're a good driver, Cookie."
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"The condition you're in at this moment is the product of your previous thoughts, to change your condition, change your thoughts."
Personal Development

"The worst enemy of life, freedom and the common decencies is total anarchy; their second worst enemy is total efficiency."

"To get matured, you must have an education in the School of Solitude!"

"Happiness is not defined by how much money you possess."

"If you want people to enter your world, you don't need to invite them; just keep your door open and keep your thoughts plain!"
Explore more quotes by John Irving

"In a school community, someone who reads a book for some secretive purpose, other than discussing it, is strange. What was she reading for?"

"Crazy people made him crazy. It was as if he personally resented them giving into madness - in part, because he so frequently labored to behave sanely. When some people gave up the labor of sanity, or failed at it, Garp suspected them of not trying hard enough."

"And what were the rules at St. Cloud's? What were Larch's rules? Which rules did Dr. Larch observe, which ones did he break, or replace--and with what confidence?"

"In increments both measurable and not, our childhood is stolen from us -- not always in one momentous event but often in a series of small robberies, which add up to the same loss."

"It s natural to want someone you love to do what you want, or what you think would be good for them, but you have to let everything happen to them. You can't interfere with people you love any more than you're supposed to interfere with people you don't even know. And that's hard, ..., because you often feel like interfering -you want to be the one who makes the plans."

"I'm not writing non-fiction. I don't feel anything about me as a kid was unique. Except that I had more interest in being alone and using my imagination."

"It's natural to want someone you love to do what you want, or what you think would be good for them, but you have to let everything happen to them. You can't interfere with people you love any more than you're supposed to interfere with people you don't even know. And that's hard. Because you often feel like interfering-you want to be the one who makes the plans. . . You can't protect people, kiddo, all you can do is love them."

"Unlike Alice, Garp was a real writer -not because he wrote more beautifully than she wrote but because he knew what every artist should know: as Garp put it, 'You only grow by coming to the end of something and by beginning something else.' Even if these so-called endings and beginnings are illusions. Garp did not write faster than anyone else, or more; he simply always worked with the idea of completion in mind."
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