To those who care about punctuation, a sentence such as "Thank God its Friday" (without the apostrophe) rouses feelings not only of despair but of violence. The confusion of the possessive "its" (no apostrophe) with the contractive "it's" (with apostrophe) is an unequivocal signal of illiteracy and sets off a Pavlovian "kill" response in the average stickler.

A good piece of fiction, in my view, does not offer solutions. Good stories deal with our moral struggles, our uncertainties, our dreams, our blunders, our contradictions, our endless quest for understanding. Good stories do not resolve the mysteries of the human spirit but rather describe and expand up on those mysteries.

Every day I ran to that book like it was a bottle of whiskey and crawled inside because it was a world that I had at least some control over, and slowly, in time, it began to take shape.

"No matter what a person does to cover up and conceal themselves, when we write and lose control, I can spot a person from Alabama, Florida, South Carolina a mile away even if they make no exact reference to location. Their words are lush like the land they come from, filled with nine aunties, people named Bubba. There is something extravagant and wild about what they have to say - snakes on the roof of a car, swamps, a delta, sweat, the smell of sea, buzz of an air conditioner, Coca-Cola - something fertile, with a hidden danger or shame, thick like the humidity, unspoken yet ever-present.

No, women like you don't write. They carve onion sculptures and potato statues. They sit in dark corners and braid their hair in new shapes and twists in order to control the stiffness, the unruliness, the rebelliousness.

In a way, literature is true than life,' he said to himself. 'On paper, you say exactly and completely what you feel. How easy it is to break things off on paper! You hate, you shout, you kill, you commit suicide; you carry things to the very end. And that's why it's false. But it's damned satisfying. In life, you're constantly denying yourself, and others are always contradicting you. On paper, I make time stand still and I impose my convictions on the whole world; they become the only reality.

A man once asked me ... how I managed in my books to write such natural conversation between men when they were by themselves. Was I, by any chance, a member of a large, mixed family with a lot of male friends? I replied that, on the contrary, I was an only child and had practically never seen or spoken to any men of my own age till I was about twenty-five. "Well," said the man, "I shouldn't have expected a woman (meaning me) to have been able to make it so convincing." I replied that I had coped with this difficult problem by making my men talk, as far as possible, like ordinary human beings. This aspect of the matter seemed to surprise the other speaker; he said no more, but took it away to chew it over. One of these days it may quite likely occur to him that women, as well as men, when left to themselves, talk very much like human beings also.

For it would seem - her case proved it - that we write, not with the fingers, but with the whole person. The nerve which controls the pen winds itself about every fibre of our being, threads the heart, pierces the liver.

The first step - especially for young people with energy and drive and talent, but not money - the first step to controlling your world is to control your culture. To model and demonstrate the kind of world you demand to live in. To write the books. Make the music. Shoot the films. Paint the art.

Lately, Nastoyna felt that she had no right to criticize anyone at all -- no man, no animal, no bird, because each lived his own life, which was not in his control and which he could not change.

Rembrandt, your life isn't written in the past. Yes, your past makes you who you are, but when you get here, you have the choice of who you want to be. Your life is written in the right now. Your choices are the only thing you can control. You have to let go of the rest. And occasionally, ask for help.

You can be doing great for months, maybe even years, and then boom, something happens, something triggers an episode. Then your life spirals into one big tornado of emotions that has swept you up right out from under yourself, and you lose control of everything, and you just spin around and around inside a dark, twisty, cloud, while everything flies out of control.

life is like the weather, unpredictable, with chances of rain, and sunny days interrupted by thunderstorms and blizzards. But even with the uncontrollable weather, a person has choices. You can grab an umbrella, wear thick socks and snow boots, put on a hat or jacket, or lather up with sunscreen. Now some people don't consider their choices and make bad ones. Those people will stand outside in a snowstorm without a coat and blame their being cold on the weather.

People who try to control people and change people's habits are the ones that make all the trouble. If you don't like somebody, walk away... But don't try and make them like you.

"life is just like flying a kite. Sometimes you have to leave it loose, sometimes you have to hold on tight, sometimes your kite will fly effortlessly, sometimes you will not be able to control it and even when you are struggling to keep it afloat and the string is cutting into your hand, don't let go.

Those who can't control themselves will find themselves under control of others.

Man does not tame and control the horse because he is strong, but because he is smarter than the animal.

We don't control our destiny. The one who is almighty has a way of getting us to our destiny.

All pain comes from the distance between where you are now and where you want to be; from the distance between what you have and what you want; the difference between who you are now and who you wish to become. And all joy comes from the constant flow in the river of life: flowing with the reality of what is, right here and right now, and moving freely into wherever direction that river takes you. Control leads to pain because control assumes that one knows better than life itself.

What you deeply resent in another, is actually a reflection of what you wish you had or what you wish you could be. Resentful of how another speaks her mind? Because you were silenced and therefore fell silent. Resentful of how another wears (or doesn't wear) whatever she wants? Because you are controlled by your own ideas of morality and societal expectations. Resentful of how another's life is not constructed to pander and please others? Because you are bound by the cruel chains of people-pleasing, you don't know how to break out of. What you resent in others is what you actually wish you could be.

Our lives have always been guided, shaped and led by a higher energy. Our education (mostly academic) and economic power (money, material wealth) make us believe that we are in control. We were never, are not and will never be in control. Life has been in control, is in control and will always be in control. The essence of intelligent living is the ability to embrace uncertainty and flow with Life, doing what you can do best in any given circumstance.

We may think that we control our lives, or our deaths? but the truth remains that we have little say over either of them. What we do bear is an ability to work within the bounds of where we exist.

Choose not to be Intimidated, stressed, worried, undermined, judged, worked out by people who are not contribute anything in your life and by people who are not helping you with anything. If they are not helping you. Then whatever they say .It doesn't matter.

Unless you take control of your life, you will forever be a slave to others. The choice is yours.