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Art Quotes

Matt Damon Quote on Taking Action Rather Than Sitting Around Thinking You’re “Too Cool”

    “It was like, ‘Why are we sitting here?  Let’s make our own movie.’  And if people come to see it, they come; and if they don’t, they don’t.  Either way it beats sitting here going crazy.  When you have so much energy and so much passion and no outlet for it and nobody cares, it’s just the worst feeling… This whole ‘I’m too cool to care’ thing… is so weak and stupid and played out, and it just brings everybody down.  You shouldn’t be too cool to care, for Christ’s sake.  You should be full of vim and vigor, and trying to do everything you can to make a change.”

    Matt Damon

    Beyond the Quote (48/365)

    Regardless of what gets you there, when the end conclusion is not caring, then all of the life that comes from caring dissolves.  Caring is exactly what drives us to listen, to pay attention, to take actions, to go above and beyond, and to think and reflect—essentially, when we don’t care, we’re choosing not to interact with the world (or at least that aspect of it).

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    Anne Lamott Quote on Writing Really Poorly Before You Ever Write Anything Good

      “People tend to look at successful writers, writers who are getting books published and maybe even doing well financially, and think that they sit down at their desks every morning feeling like a million dollars, feeling great about who they are and how much talent they have and what a great story they have to tell; that they take a few deep breaths, push back their sleeves, roll their necks a few times to get all the cricks out, and dive in, typing fully formed passages as fast as a court reporter. But this is just fantasy of the uninitiated. I know some very great writers, writers you love who write beautifully and have made a great deal of money, and not one of them sits down routinely feeling wildly enthusiastic and confident. Not one of them writes elegant first drafts… For me and most other writers I know, writing is not rapturous. If fact, the only way I can get anything written at all is to write really, really shitty first drafts.”

      Anne Lamott

      Beyond the Quote (43/365)

      For all of you who are intimidated by the dreaded blank page and have insecurities and self-doubts about writing (or creating in general), let me reassure you: we ALL start out with really, really shitty first drafts.  Not even the best writers in the world (the ones who you envision typing out those perfect, fully formed passages as fast as a court reporters can type) write their final copy on their first try.  It just doesn’t happen.  So, drop the expectation that you’ll be able to do that yourself (sorry not sorry)!

      Read More »Anne Lamott Quote on Writing Really Poorly Before You Ever Write Anything Good

      Jonas Mekas Quote on Choosing Art and Beauty Against Ugliness and Horrors

        “I choose art and beauty, vague as those terms are, against ugliness and horrors in which we live today.  For somebody to look at a flower or listen to music does something to one, has a positive effect, and being surrounded by ugliness and horror does something negative.  So I feel my duty not to betray those poets, scientists, saints, singers, troubadours of the past centuries who did everything that humanity would become more beautiful.”

        Jonas Mekas, via Happiness is a Choice You Make (Page 45)

        Beyond the Quote (20/365)

        If it bleeds it leads.  If you haven’t heard this expression before, it’s sort of the unannounced, unofficial but predominantly popular strategy for many media outlets that represents the idea of using fear and despondency to keep viewers tuned in, listening, and coming back to them for more.  It’s popular because it works and because it works it helps media companies sell more advertisements and improve their bottom-line.

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        Bernard Malamud Quote on Writing—There’s No Secret Practice

          “There’s no one way [to write] — there’s too much drivel about this subject.  You’re who you are, not Fitzgerald or Thomas Wolfe.  You write by sitting down and writing.  There’s no particular time or place — you suit yourself, your nature.  How one works, assuming he’s disciplined, doesn’t matter.  If he or she is not disciplined, no sympathetic magic will help.  The trick is to make time — not steal it — and produce the fiction.  If the stories come, you get them written, you’re on the right track.  Eventually everyone learns his or her own best way.  The real mystery to crack is you.”

          Bernard Malamud, via Daily Rituals

          Beyond the Quote (16/365)

          If Dwayne Johnson AND Jocko Willink both wake up at 4am to get their workouts done, given how wildly busy and in shape they both are, then that must be the best time to wake up and workout, right?  To answer that from personal experience, no.  I have tried to build that idea into my routine several times and have failed awfully each and every time.  I experienced so much misery and resistance that I felt like even if I mustered together ALL of my willpower from a day, it wouldn’t be enough to get me through one 4am workout—let alone a lifetime of them.  So, what gave?

          Read More »Bernard Malamud Quote on Writing—There’s No Secret Practice

            “Whatever it is for you, our lives were meant to be spent making our contribution to the world, not merely consuming the world that others create.” ~ James Clear, Blog

              “Maybe we should develop a Crayola bomb as our next secret weapon. A happiness weapon. A beauty bomb. And every time a crisis developed, we would launch one. It would explode high in the air – explode softly – and send thousands, millions, of little parachutes into the air. Floating down to earth – boxes of Crayolas. And we wouldn’t go cheap, either – not little boxes of eight. Boxes of sixty-four, with the sharpener built right in. With silver and gold and copper, magenta and peach and lime, amber and umber and all the rest. And people would smile and get a little funny look on their faces and cover the world with imagination.” ~ Robert Fulghum

                “Innovation doesn’t happen because there’s some person who’s in some great circumstance and everything is going well and they get on a roll and they make something for the world.  Innovation happens—art happens—because of suffering.” ~ Claire Wineland, Klick MUSE New York

                  “Understand: to create a meaningful work of art or to make a discovery or invention requires great discipline, self-control, and emotional stability.  It requires mastering the forms of your field.  Drugs and madness only destroy such powers.  Do not fall for the romantic myths and clichés that abound in culture about creativity—offering us the excuse or panacea that such powers can come cheaply.  When you look at the exceptionally creative work of Masters, you must not ignore the years of practice, the endless routines, the hours of doubt, and the tenacious overcoming of obstacles these people endured.  Creative energy is the fruit of such efforts and nothing else.” ~ Robert Greene, Mastery

                    “Your task as a creative thinker is to actively explore the unconscious and contradictory parts of your personality, and to examine similar contradictions and tensions in the world at large.  Expressing these tensions within your work in any medium will create a powerful effect on others, making them sense unconscious truths or feelings that have been obscured or repressed.” ~ Robert Greene, Mastery

                      “There is vitality, a life force, energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all of time, this expression is unique.  And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost.  The world will not have it.  It is not your business to determine how good it is nor how valuable nor how it compares with other expressions.  It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open.  You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work.  You have to keep yourself open and aware of the urges that motivate you.  Keep the channel open…” ~ Martha Graham, via How To Live A Good Life

                        “Like your private bedroom, your writing room should be private, a place where you go to dream.  Your schedule — in at about the same time every day, out when your thousand words are on paper or disk — exists in order to habituate yourself, to make yourself ready to dream just as you make yourself ready to sleep by going to bed at roughly the same time each night and following the same ritual as you go.  In both writing and sleeping, we learn to be physically still at the same time we are encouraging our minds to unlock from the humdrum rational thinking of our daytime lives.  And as your mind and body grow accustomed to a certain amount of sleep each night —six hours, seven, maybe the recommended eight — so can you train your waking mind to sleep creatively and work out the vividly imagined waking dreams which are successful works of fiction.” ~ Stephen King, via Daily Rituals

                          “I’ve never believed that one should wait until one is inspired because I think that the pleasures of not writing are so great that if you ever start indulging them you will never write again.” ~ John Updike, via Daily Rituals