Guided only by their feeling for symmetry simplicity and generality and an indefinable sense of the fitness of things creative mathematicians now as in the past are inspired by the art of mathematics rather than by any prospect of ultimate usefulness.

Fear is the enemy. I distrust it. Any feeling or decision I make that might be motivated by fear I quickly reassess.

I think there's a lot projected on beautiful women period. At least maybe this is just my fear but I do sometimes feel dismissed before I've even been allowed to participate. I have moments of feeling really wounded. But I am pretty optimistic and I do enjoy a lot of my life.

You know that day after day of Oh God what am I going to do with myself feeling? The fear of the emptiness that it implies keeps me going.

I'm completely in love with the world but also terrified of it. It creates some overwhelming feelings. Wanting to battle out that joy and fear is part of my music.

My greatest fear is feeling like a professional novelist. Somebody who creates characters who sits down and has pieces of paper taped to the wall - what's going to happen in this scene or this act. What I like is for it to be a much more scary sloppy reflection of who I am.

I woke up full of hate and fear the day before the most recent peace march in San Francisco. This was disappointing: I'd hoped to wake up feeling somewhere between Virginia Woolf and Wavy Gravy.

I know not why there is such a melancholy feeling attached to the remembrance of past happiness except that we fear that the future can have nothing so bright as the past.

When you're young you're always wondering when you're actually going to feel like a grownup. And I think you probably fear it in a sense too. There's a danger to feeling like an adult... like this whimsical kid in you is going to die or something. And then all of a sudden one day you kind of feel like an adult and it's really nice.

My feelings for Ellen overrode all of my fear about being out as a lesbian. I had to be with her and I just figured I'd deal with the other stuff later.