It’s good to be selfish. But not so self-centered that you never listen to other people.
Life is bittersweet. Inside our heads, if we’re lucky, we’re the same kids as we were when we were young.
You really don’t create an authoritarian society unless you control the personal choices including the sexual choices of the people.
Part of the sexual revolution is bringing rationality to sexuality – because when you don’t embrace sexuality in a normal way, you get the twisted kinds, and the kinds that destroy lives.
I think that the major message of my life and what I hope to be remembered for is someone who managed to change the social sexual values of his time absolutely.
If you let society and your peers define who you are, you’re the less for it.
I have no plans to retire. It’s the perfect combination of work and play that keeps you young. If I quit work it would be the beginning of the end for me.
My life is an open book. With illustrations.
I looked back on the roaring Twenties, with its jazz, ‘Great Gatsby’ and the pre-Code films as a party I had somehow managed to miss.
I dreamed impossible dreams. And the dreams turned out beyond anything I could possibly imagine. You know, from my point of view, I’m the luckiest cat on the planet.
For me, the magazine was always the heart of what my life was all about, and the other half was living the life.
What surprises me about getting older is that I remain so young.
Could I be in a better place and happier than I am today? I don’t think so.
I think getting married was a mistake along the way, but at the same time I wouldn’t have the wonderful children I have if I didn’t get married.
As Ray Bradbury – a longtime contributor to Playboy – said a long time ago, a lot of people, when they’re talking about the contents of the magazine, they don’t see the forest. People don’t see the other part of my life because they’re too fascinated with the girls.
I always think, quite frankly that pop culture is a lot more important than a lot of people realize.
I am not primarily an entrepreneurial businessman. I’m primarily a playboy philosopher.
Power has not corrupted me. I have not become jaded. I wake up every day well aware of my good fortune, loving the work I do, loving my life, realizing that life is a crapshoot and I’m on a roll second to none.
Several girlfriends are easier to handle than one wife.
I urge one and all to live this life as if there is no reward in the afterlife and to do it in a moral way that makes it better for you and for those around you, and that leaves this world a little better place than when you found it.