I was not a child prodigy, because a child prodigy is a child who knows as much when it is a child as it does when it grows up.
I have enjoyed greatly the second blooming... suddenly you find - at the age of 50, say - that a whole new life has opened before you.
You should not live one way in private, another in public.
Photographers do this for a living, every single day -- they point their lenses toward every single corner of our world and somehow make the mundane mesmerizing through their artistic eye. It's all a matter of being aware of your surroundings and realizing that there are some really amazing and interesting things to look at, even if it may just be something so simple as a wall being covered up by paint.
Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself and know that everything in this life has a purpose.
Realize that true happiness lies within you. Waste no time and effort searching for peace and contentment and joy in the world outside. Remember that there is no happiness in having or in getting, but only in giving. Reach out. Share. Smile. Hug. Happiness is a perfume you cannot pour on others without getting a few drops on yourself.
Sitting in the back of that Hummer, my head in a hood, my hands lashed behind my back, lurching back and forth while the bruises swelled up on my head, terrorism suddenly felt a lot riskier.