life

Write your obituary and try to figure out how to live up to it.

Some things are like that—they strike you as repugnant for instinctive reasons, probably having to do with your culture and the way you were raised. The French word “gauche” comes to mind, but I preferred the Hebrew word “treyf.” Literally, it means not kosher, but I also use it to describe things like cars, bars, strip clubs, guns, dogs, rock-n-roll, and football games. Things that are treyf, you avoid, not because you hate them per se, but because in avoiding them you keep yourself from becoming like the people you hate.

Čistim, čistim, čistim.
Bacim metlu, pa mislim.
Mislim, mislim, mislim. 
Uzmem metlu, pa čistim.

When I was young, people would say to me: 'Wait until you're 50; then you'll see.'

I am 50 now. I haven't seen anything.

Ne dozvolite detetu normalnu muziku niti književnost. Biće mu muka od onoga što ga okružuje. Ja već posle Servantesa nisam mogao, bez suza, da gledam ovo đubre oko nas. Dajte mu nešto lagano, optimistično, kako bi dete moglo da postane javni tužilac ili potpredsednica Vlade.

I generally try to avoid people and situations that put me in bad moods, which is good advice whether you care about productivity or not.

If I knew I was going to live this long, I'd have taken better care of myself.

Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.

One of the most critical skills in life—and yet never taught in school—is choosing where to direct your attention.

After graduation, the valedictorian will often get lapped by "average" people who better invest their time.

If you suffered in life and want other people to suffer as you did because "you turned out fine," you did not in fact turn out fine.