When someone sets out to be controversial or provocative or shocking as an end in itself, I don't think that's a noble goal.
Art is not meant to change the world, but when you see people interacting, when you see an impact on their lives, then I guess in a smaller way, this is changing the world. So, that's what I believe in. That's why I'm into creating more and more interactions.
The act of listening is in fact an act of composing.
Judging by informal observation, most young Americans burn up their spare time buffing their emotional IQ and self-esteem with social media and non-stop texting. That's great for eye-thumb coordination, but what about the satisfaction of actually making something?
It's funny because everyone says, 'Oh you're reclusive; you don't do social media,' but it's not about being reclusive. I like direct contact, and I like contact that's purposeful.
You care enough, that you want your life to be fulfilled in a living way, not in a painting way, not in a writing way... you really do want it to be involving in living, corresponding with other living objects, moving, changing, that kind of thing.
And all knowledge is vain save when there is work, and all work is empty save when there is love; and when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and to one another, and to God.
I think it’s a wonderful view that care was important – but I think you can make a one-off and not care and you can make a million of something and care. Whether you really care or not is not driven by how many of the products you’re going to make.
Don't think you can relax yourself to happiness. Happiness comes as a result of doing.
The greatest happiness comes from the greatest activity.
We remain committed to inspiring and compelling social change to the world's most pressing problems through the power of great stories and engaging our audiences to take meaningful action.
Art is not about objects of high monetary exchange. It's about reasserting our firsthand experience in present time.
The most important thing for anyone, I think, is to be engaged, whether you're an artist or a journalist is to be engaged in the process at some level.
It's super dope when you connect with something personally.
I would be a liar, a hypocrite, or a fool - and I'm not any of those - to say that I don't write for the reader. I do. But for the reader who hears, who really will work at it, going behind what I seem to say. So I write for myself and that reader who will pay the dues.
It's tremendous what can happen when suddenly you make an emotional connection.
There is hope for a man who has never read Malory or Boswell or Tristam Shandy or Shakespeare's Sonnets: but what can you do with a man who says he "has read" them, meaning he has read them once, and thinks that this settles the matter?
It's much easier to wear a Chairman Mao button and shake your fists in the air and all that, then to actually read the Communist manifesto and things like that and actually become involved in politics.
If we are to be really great people, we must strive in good faith to play a great part in the world. We cannot avoid meeting great issues. All that we can determine for ourselves is whether we shall meet them well or ill.
It is not important for me as a writer that you leave a piece of writing of mine with either an agreement or even a resonance with what I have said. What is important is that you leave with the resonance of what you have felt and what you thought in reaction to that.
Make this the golden rule, the equivalent of the Hippocratic oath: Everything we ask a child to do should be worth doing.
Circumstance has no value. It is how one relates to a situation that has value. All true meaning resides in the personal relationship to a phenomenon... what it means to you.
If you have an opportunity to reach people on a broad scale, it's not enough to just entertain people. You have to take responsibility. You has to do something substantial. Otherwise you're squandering what you have.
I don't ever want to do stuff just for the sake of it.
I don't ever want to take a part in order to prove that I'm capable of doing something. It's all based in doing stuff that's interesting or working with people who would be fun to work with.
