A Quote by Doris Lessing
I'm going to make the obvious point that maybe the word neurotic means the condition of being highly conscious and developed. The essence of neurosis is conflict. But the essence of living now, fully, not blocking off to what goes on, is conflict. In fact I've reached the stage where I look at people and say - he or she, they are whole at all because they've chosen to block off at this stage or that. People stay sane by blocking off, by limiting themselves.
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In fact I've reached the stage where I look at people and say - he or she, they are whole at all because they've chosen to block off at this stage or that. People stay sane by blocking off, by limiting themselves.
Well, just coming off the stage and there's like 180,000 people out there and your adrenaline is going so high, and you're doing so much and it's hard to just put your head on the pillow and sleep because it just goes on and on, even after you're off the stage.
An artist, in my experience, is a man or woman of unusual talent and peculiar, highly individual sensibility, with an independent and probably contrary mind, driven by mysterious passions for which another word is neurosis. In getting from point A to point B, the neurotic goes via point Q. It's in that roundabout that people are either completely crippled and hopeless in life, or highly creative.
Actresses are such very dull people off the stage. We are only delightful and brilliant when we are doing what we are told to do. Off stage we are awful chumps.
Love, experienced thus, is a constant challenge; it is not a resting place, but a moving, growing, working together; even whether there is harmony or conflict; joy or sadness, is secondary to the fundamental fact that two people experience themselves from the essence of their existence, that they are only one with each other by being one with themselves, rather than by fleeing from themselves.
Human nature being what it is, peace must inevitably be a relative condition. The essence of life is struggle and competition, and to that extent perfect peace is an almost meaningless abstraction. Struggle and competition are stimulating, but when they degenerate into conflict it is usually both destructive and disruptive. The aim of political institutions like the United Nations is to draw the line between struggle and conflict and to make it possible for nations to stay on the right side of that line.
Inherent in being proactive and trying things and not waiting to be told what to do is the fact that you're going to fail, you're going to make mistakes, and you're probably going to piss people off. And if you're not pissing people off, if you don't have haters, if you're not putting yourself in a situation that has some risks associated with it, you're probably not going to realize your full potential.
Now, I want to explain something to you guys. I don't have an ending joke, because I don't tell jokes. I tell real-life stories and make them funny. So, I'm not like the average comedian. They have an ending joke; they always holler Peace! I'm out of here, and walk off stage. So, basically, when I get through performing on stage, I just walk off.
What's cool is that Oprah is the same person on stage and in front of a camera as she is off stage and behind the scenes. She speaks the same way on camera as she does off camera.
When you have a conflict, that means that there are truths that have to be addressed on each side of the conflict. And when you have a conflict, then it's an educational process to try to resolve the conflict. And to resolve that, you have to get people on both sides of the conflict involved so that they can dialogue.
I tell people that anything that could ever happen to you on stage has happened to me. My clothes have fallen off. I've fallen off the stage. I've gotten sick - anything.
I did a play in high school, then one in college. My first professional experience was off-off-Broadway. I'm conveniently blocking the title. I'm sure I was terrible.
You won't have a story unless you have conflict, which means if there's no conflict in a situation, people look for a way to make some.
When you have people who are embarrassing themselves for a living, who are making themselves look foolish and vulnerable and emotional for a living, your day-to-day reality is going to be a high-wire act. People are going to get in fights. People are going to get upset. People are going to walk off set. People are going to call each other names. It happens on every film that has any emotional people.
I find that a small sacrifice such as switching off my phone and blocking out work helps me stay balanced.
Whatever my lens is, it's always going to be trying my best to see something through what I believe is going to be God's word, and not God's word in the essence of dogma or in the essence of religion, or to be right and to make other people wrong.
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