I think the musicians I play with solo do a certain thing that the musicians we play with with the Indigo Girls don't do. It's just a different thing. And it sort of steers my writing in some ways.
I lived in Chicago for a few years and got a sense of - kind of that broad-shouldered, windy, um, stern, Midwestern, warm-slash-passive aggressive, wonderful - every adjective I can think of, very cold.
I know when a story is finished when there is not a single thing more I can think to do to it. And since I know at the start what the last line will be, I know when I've reached that point as logically as I can that it's finished. As for the rewriting-it's not foolproof, of course, but if you're honest about having thought of every possibility and you still come back to what you have, what more can you do?
Hereby perceive we the love of God, because He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren." How often I think of that 'ought.' No sugary sentiment there. Just the stern, glorious trumpet call, OUGHT. But can words tell the joy buried deep within? Mine cannot. It laughs at words.
I can be very polite, and I think that people can confuse that for all sorts of things... But I'll take that over people assuming that I'm smart just because I'm short and rude.
Compromise is not popular. It's not at all popular among young people who these days call themselves "activists." They think compromises are dishonest, opportunistic, humiliating. Not in my vocabulary.
If people are pro-Israel, they are pro-Israel one-hundred-and-twenty percent. If they are anti-Israel or pro-Palestinian, they tend to be pro-Palestinian one-hundred-and-twenty percent. I don't think a decent person has to choose between being pro-Israel and pro-Palestine. I think you have to be pro-Peace.
... And if Europe gives Arabia a railway, Arabia gives Europe an idea - which I think balances the account.
I think you need a very strong mind to be on social media because people are mean and ignorant out there.
There's so much power in allegory, to form ideas and learn lessons that you can actually take and apply to real life. I think that's why I originally really loved fantasy and reading.
I'm too measured and controlling - about everything. That's why I take Lexapro. It's for OCD. I don't feel like I'm struggling with it. I think OCD is a part of me that protects me. It's also the part of me that I use in my job, in a positive way.
I think being a woman in any business that's dominated by men, you have your garden variety pros and cons, where you learn how to focus and harness your various powers and weaknesses for better or for good.
I do think that at least when we're thinking about ourselves as living, conscious, human beings we are dynamic wholes.
There are moments that aren't great. And I think it's amazing for people to be able to have some insight, to be able to see the support system and what really happens.
I think one of my big skills is making unlikable characters likable or real in some way. No matter how hateful people are, there's always something vulnerable about them, or something that you can understand or relate to. I think that's my job as an actress - to find those.
Liberal progressivism evolved after our Constitution. It has repeatedly failed all over the world so why do we think it could be successful here in the United States of America?
I think it was when I ran into Kerouac and Burroughs - when I was 17 - that I realized I was talking through an empty skull... I wasn't thinking my own thoughts or saying my own thoughts.
I don’t think there’s any problem with advancing consciousness and becoming more and more aware of the struggle, not with the world, not to convince other people to do anything. The really interesting think is the struggle with the self, and the relation with the self, and there is no end to the improvement that can be done there, the discoveries that can be made.
Ordinary mind includes eternal perceptions. Notice what you notice. Observe what's vivid. Catch yourself thinking. Vividness is self-selecting. And remember the future.
So the problem for the poetic artist or the photographer is the common problem of continuous attentiveness, continuous attempts to notice what he is noticing, continuous alertness to catch himself thinking or seeing, devotional attentiveness to the world he's moving through.
I have a new method of poetry. All you got to do is look over your notebooks... or lay down on a couch, and think of anything that comes into your head, especially the miseries. Then arrange in lines of two, three or four words each, don't bother about sentences, in sections of two, three or four lines each.
Primates stand at a turning point in the course of evolution. Primates are to the biologist what viruses are to the biochemist. They can be analysed and partly understood according to the rules of a simpler discipline, but they also present another level of complexity: viruses are living chemicals, and primates are animals who love and hate and think.
I love New York, and I would love to try to live here for a while if I ever got the chance, but it's also extremely hectic. I don't think I would cope with that.
[I] educate people to be kinder to each other, and to other life-forms. There has been racism, sexism and now there is 'species-ism.' People think that they are better than other creatures.
I was terrified of vault, like literally I hated it. I had a fear of running as fast as I could at a solid object, which is I think a normal fear to have because nobody would really want to do that. Once I got over the fear of running into the table I just kind of relaxed and now it's like autopilot. I love it.
