Thinking Quotes
-
When Denzel [Washington] first called me on the phone after we'd just done a reading of the film ["Fences"]. He said, "Oh Viola it was so good, wasn't it?! I'm gonna tell Russell [Hornsby] to lose a little bit of weight and..." I was just sitting there thinking, why is he calling me? And I told him, "Denzel don't you tell me to lose weight!" He said, "I'm not telling you to lose weight! I can't believe you would say that."
-
I've always felt like I'm on the outside. I think certain people judge you right away, and I've always been acutely sensitive to that. I'm fighting, whether it's accurate or not, a perception that I get of people thinking I'm dumb.
-
I come to work every day thinking I have to earn my job, and I really believe that. I don't have a given right to my job; I need to prove my value in my role every single day.
-
It's funny - my wife is more jealous of my books than of other women because I'm always working and thinking about my books.
-
The Marine Corps has just been called by the New York Times, 'The elite of this country.' I think it is the elite of the world.
-
I was thinking about how fleeting and precious life is. Life is also arbitrary. For example, the choices that you make, the luck of being born into the right bed, to parents who support and help you and who love you. That doesn't always happen - and then, what happens when it doesn't?
-
I know the British press is very attached to the lobby system. It lets the journalists and the politicians feel proud of their traditional freedoms while giving the reader as much of the truth as they think is good for him.
-
When I was fired from my post as General of the Fighter Arm, I was to give proof that this jet was a superior fighter. And that's when we did it. I think we did it.
-
I loved it. I just thought I wanted to stay in college forever. I came to New York all by myself; I didn't have any friends there. But it was fine. I felt comfortable. I started thinking, 'Maybe graduate school?' I was really cool with people who were smart, who knew stuff. It's very romantic and stimulating.
-
My definition of an intellectual is someone who can listen to the William Tell Overture without thinking of the Lone Ranger.
-
I think certain people would be moved to be nostalgic about America's glory days, when the music set the tone for the cultural conversation and popular musicians had this absurd level of authority.
-
I remember thinking, "My little sister is going to be something super special," because you always seemed to know what you wanted. And I'm just curious, where did that come from?
-
Get into a line that you will find to be a deep personal interest, something you really enjoy spending twelve to fifteen hours a day working at, and the rest of the time thinking about.
-
Somehow I think that if Toronto had been forced to wait a decade [from 80th], it would be a better looking city.
-
People don't know how heavily involved I am in my own career. I'm on 15 to 25 conference calls every few days strategizing with my team. I think a lot of artists sit back and have it done for them. Sometimes as women in the industry - if you're sexy or like doing sexy things - some people subconsciously negate your brain. They think you're stupid.
-
I can put two and two together, you know. Do not think you are dealing with a man who has lost his grapes.
-
Elegance of language may not be in the power of all of us; but simplicity and straight forwardness are. Write much as you would speak; speak as you think. If with your inferior, speak no coarser than usual; if with your superiors, no finer.
-
I don't listen to music before a race - my coach doesn't like it, he thinks I might lose my focus and concentration.
-
I think that a good person can sometimes do wrong out of ignorance or weakness or wrong thinking, but when hard times come, the goodness wins out after all. And a bad person can often seem good and trustworthy for a long time, but when hard times come, the evil in him gets revealed.
-
People think once you get famous and rich you move out of the public sphere and you have nothing left to write about. I've heard that - Bruce Springsteen was this real street boy, now he's got this big house. How does that compute? If you don't look at the material side of someone's life, if you look at more the emotional side, there's always a wealth of stuff to write about.
-
I always think I don't have any songs, I don't have anything I'm working on, and I get in the studio and realize there are 20 things I'm thinking about. It's just kind of second nature.
-
As an observer, I'm analysing my reactions, I guess, and my thinking; but about the process of writing... I am not very talented at talking about what I do as a writer.
-
America used to be proud of abstraction, and we have fallen away from it. The future depends on people trying to promote that abstract thinking. Not just in relation to music and jazz and the arts, but the economy, social strife, tension between people.
-
When I am writing poetry, I try to make my mind go a little lazy, to not think too much, as a way of opening up the part of the brain that makes poems. If I'm successful in this part of the process I'm often not. If my mind gets too lazy it will linger in familiar boring territory, it's like my mind can stroke the physical world.
