When I see a film, I'll remember that there was a time when it wasn't working, and there was some pain and angst in order to get it to work.

Certainly one of the surprising truths of having a book published is realizing that your book is as open to interpretation as an abstract painting. People bring their own beliefs and attitudes to your work, which is thrilling and surprising at the same time.

Yoga is great for easing my back pain. It also helps me keep stress at bay, which is something I can suffer from.

If I had to compare myself to another artist, I wouldn't. I feel like my lyrics are really strong. I'm good at painting pictures and telling picture stories.

I don't want to show my pain. I resisted; I hesitated. I tried to be invisible, to pretend that nothing was wrong. It's impossible; it's not like me.

Actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness; wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure and the absence of pain.

Smallpox can be personally devastating. After a 14-day incubation period, patients experience high fevers, headaches, and sometimes severe abdominal pain. A rash resembling chicken pox appears in the mouth and throat, face, and forearms, and spreads to the trunk and legs. As patients recover, scabs break and pitted scars appear.

I think people think filmmaking is fun, but I've never thought that. For me it's always been a lot of work and pain and stress.

I think, as an artist, you have to have experienced some deep turmoil, some kind of pain, because that's what connects you with the world. That's what makes it juicy!

What I find compelling is the moment in which people realize, with suffering and pain, that in the past there was a time when they were happy, because back then the present and the future coincided - they were one and the same thing.

Michael Vick may enjoy watching dogs fight. Someone else may find that repulsive but see nothing wrong with eating an animal who has had a life as full of pain and suffering as the lives of the fighting dogs. It's strange that we regard the latter as morally different from, and superior to, the former.

I became an American on Nov. 4, 2010, at an elegant ceremony in Great Hall of Bullfinch's Faneuil Hall, Boston, beneath a vast painting of Daniel Webster debating the preservation of the Union with Robert Hayne of South Carolina, before the Civil War.

Painting is just another way of keeping a diary.

You have to use your pain as your gift. If you're able to take something really negative and repackage it as something positive, you've nailed it.

You've not felt the pain of rejection until a television show based on your own life is canceled.

Pain is funnier than love.

Find a place inside where there's joy, and the joy will burn out the pain.

I get a fine warm feeling when I'm doing well, but that pleasure is pretty much negated by the pain of getting started each day. Let's face it, writing is hell.

We know that young babies, as they become capable of moving voluntarily, will share. They will share food, for instance, with their siblings and with kids that are around. They will sooth. If they see somebody else in pain, even the youngest of toddlers will try to reach out and pat the person.

I make sure I make a painting - that's my job. And I cook the Sunday dinner.