A Quote by Michael Stahl-David

Nothing bonds a group of people better when they are thrown into a situation where they have no idea what's going on and what's going to happen. — © Michael Stahl-David
Nothing bonds a group of people better when they are thrown into a situation where they have no idea what's going on and what's going to happen.
Increasingly I think of myself as some strange and solitary conductor, introduced to a group of very dynamic musicians who happen to be my characters, and I have no idea how they are going to play together, and I have certainly no idea how I am going to put manners on them.
For policemen to be honest about the fact that they may be fearful when they come into a certain situation, not understanding what's going to happen. The only way things will change and things will get better is if people are able to be honest without feeling like they're going to be offended, or they're going to offend someone else.
There are people who haven't faced the reality of what has gone on in Iraq. They still think that the old central state is going to be put back together again. It's not going to happen in Kurdistan. It's not going to happen in the south. It's not going to happen in Baghdad.
I have an idea and a first line -- and that suggests the rest of it. I have little concept of what I’m going to say, or where it’s going. I have some idea of how long it’s going to be -- but not what will happen or what the themes will be. That’s the intrigue of doing it -- it’s a process of discovery. You get to discover what you’re going to say and what it’s going to mean.
One of the things that really impressed me about Anna Karenina when I first read it was how Tolstoy sets you up to expect certain things to happen - and they don't. Everything is set up for you to think Anna is going to die in childbirth. She dreams it's going to happen, the doctor, Vronsky and Karenin think it's going to happen, and it's what should happen to an adulteress by the rules of a nineteenth-century novel. But then it doesn't happen. It's so fascinating to be left in that space, in a kind of free fall, where you have no idea what's going to happen.
I'm going to remember this, I told myself sternly. I'm going to remember how awful they made me feel today. So when I'm scared and alone and whatever else is going to happen to me starts to happen, I'm going to remember that nothing about be as bad as being stuck here.Nothing.
The idea of going down to Central or South American and taking ayahuasca and shitting my pants and puking in a circle of overprivileged white people is not my idea of a good time. That's not going to happen.
Music itself is going to become like running water or electricity. So it's like, just take advantage of these last few years because none of this is ever going to happen again. You'd better be prepared for doing a lot of touring because that's really the only unique situation that's going to be left.
People can demand someone they've never met be arrested and thrown in jail forever because they know it's never going to happen and they're never going to see this person.
Expectations are usually predicated on the idea that the everyday things that happen to ordinary people shouldn't happen to you. People hold the idea of being ordinary in absolute contempt, so when they face an illness, poverty, or any kind of catastrophe, they say, 'I can't believe this happened to me.' And who did you think it was going to happen to - the woman across the street?
I don't like when people say, 'I'll pray for you. I'm going to pray for you. Praying for you.' You're going to pray for me? So you're going to sit at home and do nothing? 'Cause that's what your prayers are; you doing nothing while I struggle with a situation. Don't pray for me - make me a sandwich or something.
When I left Africa in 1966 it seemed to me to be a place that was developing, going in a particular direction, and I don't think that is the case now. And it's a place where people still kid themselves - you know, in a few years this will happen or that will happen. Well, it's not going to happen. It's never going to happen.
If something is going to happen, whether you want it to happen or not, it is going to happen. And you are much better off cannibalizing yourself, or being ahead of whatever direction the world is headed than you are howling at the wind or wishing it away or trying to put up blockers.
We are not going to let it happen where [foreign corporations and their CEO's ] decide the outcome of our elections. They can't do it and we're not going to let it happen. This is our last chance to save our country and reclaim it for we the people, and it's going to happen.
Nothing is going to happen to me, or you, for that matter. Anything can happen, though. Anything can happen. But most always, just normal things happen, and people have happy lives.
I've got to think about what I'm going to say very carefully. There's two avenues of thought: Do you stop everyone going, ban all the artists coming in from Russia? But then you're really leaving the men and women who are gay and suffering under the antigay laws in an isolated situation. As a gay man, I can't leave those people on their own without going over there and supporting them. I don't know what's going to happen, but I've got to go.
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