when all this started, I asked myself, 'Am I going to withdraw from the world, like most people do, or am I going to live?' I decided I am going to live-or at least try to live-the way I want, with dignity, with courage, with humor, with composure.

Morrie was in a wheelchair full-time now, getting used to helpers lifting him like a heavy sack from the chair to the bed and the bed to the chair.

There is everything you know and there is everything that happens. When the two do not line up, you make a choice.

..I buried myself in accomplishments, because with accomplishments, I believed I could control things, I could squeeze in every last piece of happiness before I got sick and died.. which I figured was my natural fate.

The last class of my old professor's life took place once a week in his house, by a window in the study where he could watch a small hibiscus plant shed its pink leaves.

There are some mornings when I cry and cry and mourn for myself. Some mornings, I'm so angry and bitter. But it doesn't last too long. Then I get up and say, 'I want to live..'
'So far, I've been able to do it. Will I be able to continue? I don't know. But I'm betting on myself I will.'
Koppel seemed extremely taken with Morrie. He asked about the humility that death induced.