Showy displays of love don't come naturally to everyone. They don't come naturally to me. They also come with a risk: a risk of rejection, being made to feel silly, or making yourself into a spectacle.
I am certainly more interested in interviewing than being interviewed. Sometimes you find yourself attacked from the start.
As a novelist, where do you go to tap into memories, and impressions, and sensations? It's usually, in my experience, your early life, before you started thinking of yourself as a writer, because somehow those experiences are unadulterated.
Private dreams are the most powerful. You have to dream of success to make it happen, and if you don't believe in yourself, nobody else will. But that doesn't mean you have to go around telling everyone about it.
I was never a big-company type of person, and my ideal job was to be self-employed. The ironic thing is you work a lot harder for yourself than you do for anybody else.
To see yourself, and for others to see you, is a form of validation. I'm interested in that very mysterious and mystical way we relate to each other in the world.
I have refused money sometimes for a film. I have refused films when I felt that it was not for me. When it was just a job or just about making money, I said no. I wanted to make every film count, and when you are true to yourself, this gives you a certain integrity and a certain reputation.
I write what I think is funny and I write from a sense of popping a balloon or a sense of injustice, whether it's about yourself, or whether it's about something else. It's my worldview; it doesn't mean that everybody has to agree with it.
If you could wean yourself off of oil and not be dependent on the Middle East, obviously it's better.
When you get a role, you completely lose yourself in it. That's one of the great things about acting - letting yourself go.
I think that when moms just give themselves up, the kids know. They feel guilty; they resent their mother for making them feel guilty, and then they grow up and do the same thing. Whereas my mother showed me that it's okay to focus on yourself.
If you want to stay fit, surround yourself with a couple of chicks who are fired up, so that the one day you're not, you can feed off their energy.
It's not hard to draw from within yourself to play someone protective of her daughter. I have animals and I'm a daughter, sister, wife, aunt and friend, and I can be fiercely protective.
If I could go back to my first year of acting school, I'd probably say: 'Relax. Stop taking yourself so seriously.'
The first step into justice begins with the politicians. You have to demand from yourself what you demand from people.
Take the time to shop for yourself and cook. All of this is an investment in yourself, and if you're not going to invest time and money in what you put in your body, then what are you going to spend money on? It's kind of the most important thing.
No matter where your lot may be cast, no power on earth can keep you from making a man of yourself, a superb character, a masterpiece.
I really think that you have to find a partner that compliments you and is somebody that pushes you and is better at some things than you are, so they can push you to improve yourself as a person.
Psych yourself up until you're confident that the world will be interested in what happens to your characters. Confidence is key.
You have to persuade yourself that you absolutely don't care what happens. If you don't care, you've won. I absolutely promise you, in every serious negotiation, the man or woman who doesn't care is going to win.
As an actor, you try to put a little bit of yourself in everything you do.
As an actor, you're listening to the other person and always trying to be present and take everything they're giving you, but when they're not there, you have to produce that yourself.
Keep yourself motivated. You've got to be motivated, you've got to wake up every day and understand what that day is about; you've got to have personal goals - short term goals, intermediate goals, and long term goals. Be flexible in getting to those goals, but if you do not have goals, you will not achieve them.
If you are fragmented and uncertain, it is terrifying to find the boundaries of yourself melt.
Even if someone is already in your market space, ask yourself whether you can approach it from a different angle and thereby secure your own customer base.
It's OK to want to feel beautiful - as long as you really do the work on yourself to be the kind of person you are proud of.
When you're not sure your anger is justified, the thing to do is ask yourself exactly where it's coming from.
You want, as an artist, to be pushing yourself to do what you haven't done before.
Many scientists have been drawn to Buddhism out of a sense that the Western tradition has delivered an impoverished conception of basic, human sanity. In the West, if you speak to yourself out loud all day long, you are considered crazy. But speaking to yourself silently - thinking incessantly - is considered perfectly normal.
When you discover first love as a teenager, your whole life revolves around it and you open yourself up to it.
Most of my interests in terms of writing are dark, so it's discordant how much I try to lock into the vibe of wherever I'm at. Inhabiting the life of the imagination is the nature of survival strategy - you build yourself little worlds to enjoy.
I mean, it's the life lessons that I suppose you learn that nobody gets a free ride and that you do the best you can with the means that you can and try to open yourself to as much knowledge and all that that you can.
We are all human beings, and we all have insecurities, but it's about being healthy and happy with yourself. I'm not perfect, and I will indulge in pizza and sweets on occasion. The goal is to make the majority of your decisions good for your body. So listen to your body, and treat it like your temple.
That's really truly what my message is - finding self love within yourself and not comparing yourself to others - because there's no such thing as perfection, because perfection doesn't exist.
When I was young, I had this feeling that there was this handbook that I had never gotten that explained how to be, how to laugh, what to wear, how to stand by yourself in the hallway. Everyone looked so natural - like they all practiced and knew exactly what to do - even the way they pushed their hair out of their face.
Limitations can be hugely creative and hugely inspiring - so long as they are the ones you choose for yourself. I will not allow anyone to take anything off my palette, but if I do, then within that, I can be creative.
