Marshall Brickman Quotes

I often find that having an idea in my head prevents me from doing something else. Working is therefore a way of getting rid of an idea.

There are definitely times - and I think this is pretty common among cartoonists - where you spend an entire day trying to think of an idea, and you're like, 'I give up.' And then you go and take a shower or run an errand, and halfway there, you get an idea.

If I get writer's block - this is going to sound funny - I take a shower. Something about the water feels like I'm cleaning my brain as well as my body.

Having imagination it takes you an hour to write a paragraph that if you were unimaginative would take you only a minute.

Weirdly, often the more I write, the more ideas I have.

Even when I don't think I'm writing, I'm writing. There's some part of my brain geared toward making songs up, and I know it's collecting things and I know when I get a moment to be by myself, that's when they come out.

I've often said that there's no such thing as writer's block; the problem is idea block.

I do not believe in inspiration, but I must have a title in order to work, otherwise I am lost.

When the ideas are coming, I don't stop until the ideas stop because that train doesn't come along all the time.

For one person, organized files might be a crucial tool for creativity; another person finds inspiration in random juxtapositions.

I don't know how to explain it, but when you're working on something constantly, and you're digging in deep, things kind of fall in, and you grab them, and you're like, 'That one!' and 'That thing!' and it starts to build something right.

You can't rush inspiration.

Whenever I finish a movie, I usually go through a period where I think I'll never have another idea. And then, somehow, you get another idea.

I learned that creativity is all about being frustrated.

Every now and again, something will pop into my head when I'm driving or I'm in the shower, you'll just get an image and it stays with you. It doesn't have to be much, it doesn't have to be a story, it could just be an image. But it won't leave your head and that's when you know you've got something.

The truth is, it is hard to know where ideas come from.

Great ideas are very much 'of the moment,' and endlessly mulling them over just takes up too much of your brain space and might block your next great idea. Act on it, give it away, or move on.

For me it's just, I have too many ideas, man. It's a problem, actually.

I don't know where the ideas come from, and it's terrifying. They seem to be absolute flukes. When I was in my 20s, I'd walk around with a notebook all the time and make sure I wrote down anything that occurred to me. Now I'm just hoping that some sort of event will descend on me.

I can't do one thing at a time. If I'm writing song lyrics, I've got to be doing the ironing or cooking or something while I'm working. If I just sit there and stare at the walls, I get nothing.

As authors, we know that it is very difficult to unleash one's creativity.

When you open your mind up, and you go into a creative state, you can't just switch if off. When you have an idea, a creative impulse, and then you ignore it, it can keep you up when you just want to go to your bed - which is why it's great to have voice recorders on your phone!

Sometimes ideas just come to me. Other times I have to sweat and almost bleed to make ideas come. It's a mysterious process, but I hope I never find out exactly how it works.

The imagination is how things get done. You have to cultivate creativity.

Just when I thought there wasn't room enough for another thought in my head, I had this great idea—