I heard endless conversations between my parents when I was going to sleep about how we would survive, how we would continue. All of them were about trying to make me better.
You can make more friends in a month by being interested in them than in ten years by trying to get them interested in you.
I wrote my first novel in the same conditions as most first novelists - I had a full-time job, I shared an apartment, I had no time - and so I became a compulsive outliner of everything. Ever since then, my process has consisted of trying to forcibly rid myself of that compulsion.
I need to keep my story count high. I'm trying to get as many stories in my hour as is humanly possible. We're telling more stories in our hour than any national newscast has in the history of this business, I think.
I dropped out of school in the 11th grade because there was no purpose in it for me. I'm not proud of this, and I'm not trying to promote it.
We've had public hearings. We've had interim reports, which our statute has encouraged us to provide to the public. We have brought the public along with us, trying to make as much available as possible over time.
The first play that I saw was 'Cyrano,' and I remember going home - I was like nine years old - and trying to learn the monologues.
Everybody is just at the start of this huge process of trying to unravel what's going on with the 4,400, where they've been and why they're back and what they're trying to do with us in the present. And we're trying to work out what messages they're sending us.
I'm not trying to say that it never hurt or that I never felt its sting, but I can honestly say that I never blamed anybody for racism. I have considered it more of a manifestation of humanity's problem rather than my personal problem.
We have a serious structural deficit problem. And it needs to be addressed. The president is trying to address it through reforms of Social Security, but the problem is there with other entitlement programs like Medicare and Medicaid.
I'm not trying to be Mr. Universe, but I want to stay in shape.
I think you'll see if you look at 'Up', we've focused a lot on labor (and the forces trying to keep labor down) and have featured everything from Wal Mart workers, to on-the-ground organizers, to union presidents to restaurant workers sitting at the table sharing their experience and expertise.
At no time was I trying to write a crossover record.
I'm very much a jobbing actor who's still trying to find a place to rent down the road.
To be an actor for 30-odd years trying to become recognized, and to end up playing a full prosthetic and a character 3 foot 9', or something like that, is... well, it just shows that you can get actors to do anything.
Time perspective is one of the most powerful influences on all of human behavior. We're trying to show how people become biased to being exclusively past-, present- or future-oriented.
Metal has its own code of cool, but it's not really trying to be cool. And that was very refreshing to me, that metal is very much about expressing something that seems awesome to you even if, at the time, much of the world was going to mock and reject it.
Well, of course it was a very trying time for me, and fortunately I had a lot of people who were supportive. A lot of people who were writing and calling and saying they were praying for me. Some people sent me Scripture, and that helped.
We often say that the biggest job we have is to teach a newly hired employee to fail intelligently... to experiment over and over again and to keep on trying and failing until he learns what will work.
I had never read in public, never given an interview. I was doing it all and trying to produce the next book and raise three young kids and had another child on the way.
There is nothing worse that a thirteen-year-old boy. You're embarrassed by your parents, and you're trying to find your independance because, deep inside, you are so dependent on your mom.
My interest only is trying to help the lives of the people of this state, try to educate people and create jobs. It's not even for me. I've never gained anything. I don't even take a salary. I've never gained anything from being here except for the joy and the privilege of serving the people of this state.
I must have been 3 years old or less, and I remember paging through these comics, trying to figure out the stories. I couldn't read the words, so I made up my own stories.
Dancing was my sport when I was younger. So I chose that over everything. And then, I just had to keep going because it became a competitive thing. But I'm not trying to impress anyone anymore. Dancing is more like my art, now.
I like people more undone than made up. Patricia Arquette is the ultimate. She's not anorexic or perfectly tan, she's not trying to be anything but what she is, and that's the most sexy thing.
If you shoot with a billion cameras, then there's no perspective. You want to use one shot at a time, so it's better to discover what that is before you shoot, rather than trying to make something in the cutting room, and then it just becomes generic.
I'm over dudes trying to look like they're in boy bands.
Well, I think that those of us in public life that are trying to do a good job, and that are faced with this popular new game that the media has of being critical of everything that anybody in public office does probably are thin-skinned.
It's no good trying to keep up old friendships. It's painful for both sides. The fact is, one grows out of people, and the only thing is to face it.
I've always tried to work hard. I'm not trying to show anybody up or do something spectacular for attention.
All of us gave it all we've got, overcame a whole lot just being on the show and learned a lot about ourselves. We're just normal people trying to do what we love and follow our dreams.
When I'm trying to go to sleep and there are little noises, like a clock ticking or a fan squeaking, it drives me completely insane.
When you truly give up trying to be whole through others, you end up receiving what you always wanted from others.
I'm not that in control of myself that I could be specific about exactly the way I'm doing everything as it happens. I'm just trying my best.
Imperfection and perfection go so hand in hand, and our dark and our light are so intertwined, that by trying to push the darkness or the so-called negative aspects of our life to the side... we are preventing ourselves from the fullness of life.
I'm trying to look into each character and try to realize her as someone who is also me.
