Build a good name. Keep your name clean. Don’t make compromises. Don’t worry about making a bunch of money or being successful. Be concerned about doing good work and protect your work. […] Protect your work and if you build a good name, eventually that name will be its own currency.

Marry somebody you love and who thinks you being a writer’s a good idea.

All over the world, girls are raised to be make themselves likeable, to twist themselves into shapes that suit other people. Please do not twist yourself into shapes to please. Don’t do it. If someone likes that version of you, that version of you that is false and holds back, then they actually just like that twisted shape, and not you.

My advice to everyone is: “Become a journalist.” ... if you have a chance to be a newspaper reporter for three or four years — before you do whatever you want to do — do it, because you will know so much.

I had lots of teachers encourage me. And I still know some of them, my high school teachers. But one of them encouraged me. She said, “Well, what do you want to do?” I said, “I want to be a doctor.” And she asked me where I wanted to go to school, and so I named all the Florida public universities which seemed within reach, financially. And she said, “Well, maybe you ought to apply to Duke, and maybe you’ll get a scholarship.” And I did both those things. I applied and got a scholarship.

I had lots of teachers encourage me. And I still know some of them, my high school teachers. But one of them encouraged me. She said, “Well, what do you want to do?” I said, “I want to be a doctor.” And she asked me where I wanted to go to school, and so I named all the Florida public universities which seemed within reach, financially. And she said, “Well, maybe you ought to apply to Duke, and maybe you’ll get a scholarship.” And I did both those things. I applied and got a scholarship. Her name is Wendy Tellone, and she’s still involved in public school teaching. I think she’s still in Florida.

And some of the things that we saw in the ’80s, really, they were failures, because patients died. But they allowed us to diagnose the systems’ problems and say, “This is where we need a community health worker system. This is where we need to make sure patients have food support while they’re getting these medicines,” et cetera. So those are examples of tragedies that certainly lead to — not just personal epiphanies — but collective epiphanies, where you say, “You know what? We can do this better if we have the system fixed.”