Ken Kesey Quotes

It seems that it is madder never to abandon one's self than often to be infatuated; better to be wounded, a captive and a slave, than always to walk in armor.

The way we can allow ourselves to do what we need to, no matter what others may say or do, is to choose love and defy fear.

How a person masters his fate is more important than what his fate is.

Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you.

Your one certainty in life, your power as a human being, is that you have a choice in every situation about what you do next and about how you take what has happened to you.

If I'm going to be a caged bird, I'll sing the best song I can.

My heart is beating, and I'm breathing, and nothing anybody has ever done has changed that.

Be courageous. Be independent. Only remember where the true courage and independence come from.

No matter how bad things get, you can still walk away.

The Hebrew word, the word timshel - 'Thou mayest' - that gives a choice. It might be the most important word in the world. That says the way is open...Why, that makes a man great...He can choose his course and fight it through and win...I have a new love for that glittering instrument, the human soul. It is a lovely and unique thing in the universe. It is always attacked and never destroyed - because 'Thou mayest'. ch 24

Love is the child of freedom, never that of domination.

The man who can be compelled knows not how to die.

Love isn’t putting chain on someone who wants to struggle and is ready to die for it, love is letting him die in the way he’s chosen.

Robots do not love. God created us with the capacity to love. Love is based upon one's right to choose to love. We cannot force others to love us. We can make them serve us or obey us. But true love is founded upon one's freedom to choose to respond.

Ultimately the way to win the game of life, is found in only one thing: Our ability to choose meaning in any life circumstance. Become the master of meaning and you master your life.

Love is perfect in proportion to it's freedom.

Through the shake of an earthquake I will never fall. That’s how strong my love is.

You have to understand. I am no one special. I am just a single girl. I am five feet two inches tall and I am in-between in every way. But I have a secret. You can build walls all the way to the sky and I will find a way to fly above them. You can try to pin me down with a hundred thousand arms, but I will find a way to resist.

Being relatively unmoved by rewards gives you the incalculable power to go your own way.

Regardless of what barriers confront you, it is in your power to free yourselves; you have only to want to.

Few are made for independence, it is the privilege of the strong.

I would die for you. But I won't live for you.

This is what it means to be a woman in this world. Every step is a bargain with pain. Make your black deals in the black wood and decide what you’ll trade for power. For the opposite of weakness, which is not strength but hardness. I am a trap, but so is everything. Pick your price. I am a huckster with a hand in your pocket. I am freedom and I will eat your heart.

It's not that you should never love something so much that it can control you. It's that you need to love something that much so you can never be controlled. It's not a weakness. It's your best strength.