In the last five years, what have you become better at saying no to?

On returning to Brisbane, I realised fairly quickly that I am an experimentalist at heart. A career as a diagnostic virologist was not for me!

Recorded · Laureate-written autobiography for Les Prix Nobel, Nobel Prize Outreach, 1 December 1996 · source

Protect the time and space in which you write. Keep everybody away from it, even the people who are most important to you.

Recorded · The Guardian Review, 20 February 2010 · source

Do restrict your browsing to a few websites a day. Don’t go near the online bookies – unless it’s research. […] Do not search amazon.co.uk for the book you haven’t written yet.

Recorded · The Guardian Review, 20 February 2010 · source

Don’t read your reviews. […] Don’t write reviews. (Your judgment’s always tainted.) […] Don’t write letters to the editor. (No one cares.)

Recorded · The Guardian Review, 20 February 2010 · source

No alcohol, sex or drugs while you are working. […] No going to London. […] No going anywhere else either.

Recorded · The Guardian Review, 20 February 2010 · source

Take no notice of anyone you don’t respect. […] Take no notice of anyone with a ­gender agenda. A lot of men still think that women lack imagination of the fiery kind.

Recorded · The Guardian Review, 20 February 2010 · source

To get this prize, I was required to talk about how important a particular European feminist woman writer had been to me. Now the truth was that I had never managed to finish this feminist writer’s book. It did not speak to me. It would have been a lie to claim that she had any major influence on my thinking. […] I could have said that this woman was important to me, and I could have talked the talk, and I could have been given the prize and a shiny present. But I didn’t.

Recorded · Wellesley College 137th Commencement, 29 May 2015 · source

What I'm not willing to accept is the enduring status quo around maternity. I asked Nike to contractually guarantee that I wouldn't be punished if I didn't perform at my best in the months surrounding childbirth. I wanted to set a new standard. If I, one of Nike's most widely marketed athletes, couldn't secure these protections, who could?

Recorded · Opinion piece, The New York Times, 22 May 2019 · source

I communicated that I wanted to skip press conferences at Roland Garros to exercise self-care and preservation of my mental health. I stand by that. Athletes are humans.

Recorded · First-person cover essay, Time, 8 July 2021 · source

I just felt like it would be a little bit better to take a back seat, work on my mindfulness. And I knew that the girls would do an absolutely great job and I didn't want to risk the team a medal for kind of my screw ups because they've worked way too hard for that. So I just decided that those girls need to go in and do the rest of the competition.

Recorded · Post-competition press conference, Ariake Gymnastics Centre, Tokyo Olympics, Rev, 27 July 2021 · source

But these days, if I have to choose between building my tennis résumé and building my family, I choose the latter.

Recorded · First-person essay, Vogue September 2022 issue, 9 August 2022 · source

I'm tired, I'm not myself and I'm not enjoying the sport as I have done for the last decade. Some might recognise it as burnout; I just know that over the last few years I haven't had the answers.

Recorded · Public statement announcing his break from swimming, April 2023, The Independent, 1 July 2023 · source

I am personally passionate and anal about non-negotiables. If those needs aren't met, I quit. Life is too short to play-act if you don't have to.

Recorded · Quartz written questionnaire · source

When I ask myself what I've found life is too short for, the word that pops into my head is “bullshit.” I realize that answer is somewhat tautological. It's almost the definition of bullshit that it's the stuff that life is too short for. And yet bullshit does have a distinctive character. There's something fake about it. It's the junk food of experience. If you ask yourself what you spend your time on that's bullshit, you probably already know the answer. Unnecessary meetings, pointless disputes, bureaucracy, posturing, dealing with other people's mistakes, traffic jams, addictive but unrewarding pastimes.

Recorded · Graham's own essay site, paulgraham.com, 2016 · source