Brendan McDevitt

“This is the other secret that real artists know and wannabe writers don’t. When we sit down each day and do our work, power concentrates around us. The Muse takes note of our dedication. She approves. We have earned favor in her sight. When we sit down and work, we become like a magnetized rod that attracts iron filings. Ideas come. Insights accrete.”
― Steven Pressfield, The War of Art

“Do not bite at the bait of pleasure till you know there is no hook beneath it.”
― Thomas Jefferson

“You will never have a greater or lesser dominion than that over yourself...the height of a man's success is gauged by his self-mastery; the depth of his failure by his self-abandonment. ...And this law is the expression of eternal justice. He who cannot establish dominion over himself will have no dominion over others.”
― Leonardo da Vinci

“Showing a lack of self-control is in the same vein granting authority to others: 'Perhaps I need someone else to control me.”
― Criss Jami, Venus in Arms