Quotes from Mindy Kaling

My family's dreams about a future unfettered by the limitations imposed by "who you know" and dependent only on "what you know" was possible only in this beautiful land. Their

But none of that mattered, because I knew the truth, which is if someone really wants to see you, they always find a way. Always. That

I was just a friendly thirty-four-year-old TV actress looking for a boyfriend who didn't have a neck tattoo.

The truth is, it's hard to get people to like you, but it's even harder to keep people liking you. You'd have to bring in Skittles every single day. The

I'm the kind of person who would rather get my hopes up really high and watch them get dashed to pieces than wisely keep my expectations at bay and hope they are exceeded. This quality has made me a needy and theatrical friend, but has given me a spectacularly dramatic emotional life.

Every kid wants approval, but my desire to be well liked was central to my personality.

Who is this invisible antiterrorist? It's me, Mindy Kaling. I was hiding behind Cee Lo's fur coat, and no one saw me.

Cinch together the whole look with a wide belt" was a very popular style in the early 2000s, which we believed accentuated our curves but in reality made a generation of women look like we were wearing lumbar support braces.

This photo is more significant because it is a rare time where my head looks normal size. I have enormous head, so it is important to me to have a few flattering, head-minimizing photos.

Thus, I never learned moderation. When I arrived at Dartmouth College in 1997, my attitude toward alcohol was that it was a delicious and dangerous treat that, when obtained, needed to be ingested quickly in case someone tried to take it away. You know, the way a raccoon eats from a garbage can.

The truth is, it's hard to get people to like you, but it's even harder to keep people liking you. You

What I didn't need was some hot-and-cold long-distance flake wasting my time. It hurt my feelings and made me feel like something was wrong with me.

If my childhood, teens, and twenties were about wanting people to like me, now I want people to know me. So,

If you believe in yourself and work hard, your dreams will come true

EVERYONE KNOWS THAT all white people are racist. And

Luckily the rope fiasco was eclipsed, several weeks later, when I accidentally pronounced jalapeño with a hard j in front of Vijay, Hondo, and some other campers. I'd only ever seen it printed on the side of a can of salsa. "You think it's ja-lapeno?!" Hondo asked, incredulous. I did.

When Your Boyfriend Fits into Your Jeans and Other Atrocities The

This story didn't end in fireworks, because the truth is, fireworks are something from my twenties. I could have made fireworks, but I chose to make a nuanced memory of a person who is neither a hero nor a villain in my life.

Greta told me when I wore an outfit that was unflattering, which was how I knew she was real. And she would do it the best way anyone had ever given me an insult: "You have so much more to offer than that skirt. Find a skirt that deserves you.

Full-on All-Night Sex-a-thon is also the name of my debut hip-hop album.

we loved reenacting what we saw. The Church Lady's catchphrases were our catchphrases, and we repeated them until my mother said, exasperated: "Please stop saying 'Isn't that special?' in that strange voice. It is annoying to me and to others." At

If you don't see a clear path for what you want, sometimes you have to make it yourself.

The one notable thing about Steve's niceness is that he is also very smart, and that kind of niceness has always made me nervous. When smart people are nice, it's always terrifying, because I know they're taking in everything and thinking all kinds of smart and potentially judgmental things.

But one thing I will impart to my children is "If you're scared of something, that isn't a sign that you have to do it. It probably means you shouldn't do it. Call Dad or Mom immediately.