A Quote by Miranda July

The idea that you might end up in a job that doesn't allow you to be who you are, over the course of a lifetime, is still one of the most chilling nightmares to me. It's a good metaphor for fears I have about losing my soul in some accidental, mundane way. So, to me, these jobs that my characters have are very loaded. They immediately suggest a complex character to me, a woman who is, say, a secretary, but also a vigilante on behalf of her own soul.
O Woe to his blinded soul! Saying this, he as it were said to God: "Thou Thyself are guilty, because the woman whom Thou gavest me hast deceived me." This very same thing I myself now suffer, wretched and miserable, when I do not desire to be humbled, and to say with my whole soul that I myself am guilty of my perdition. But on the contrary I say: "That person over there inspired me to do or say this. He advised me and knocked me off the path." Woe is my poor soul which speaks such words filled with sin! O most shameless and irrational words of a shameless and irrational soul!
All day I think about it, then at night I say it. Where did I come from, and what am I supposed to be doing? I have no idea. My soul is from elsewhere, I’m sure of that,and I intend to end up there. Who looks out with my eyes? What is the soul? I cannot stop asking. If I could taste one sip of an answer, I could break out of this prison for drunks. I didn’t come here of my own accord, and I can’t leave that way. Whoever brought me here, will have to take me home.
Education is fundamental. And I know some aren't blessed to be afforded the luxury, 'cause as sad as it is in 2016, it is still a luxury. I'd say when you're young, look for someone, an older woman, you'd like to emulate. Not necessarily her career, but the soul and essence of that woman. I use women like Susan Taylor and Tyra Banks to girdle me up so I can find my own strength and forge my own path.
Working with Bernardo Bertolucci, director of Stealing Beauty was my first experience of being able to communicate with someone whom I'd think of as a mentor, who'd ask me my opinion and trust me, and believe in me and allow me to do the things that I wanted to do. The film itself was also rare in terms of character most of the scripts I've read are the story of some man, and there might be a love interest or a big woman's part.
For some nights I slept profoundly; but still every morning I felt the same lassitude, and a languor weighed upon me all day. I felt myself a changed girl. A strange melancholy was stealing over me, a melancholy that I would not have interrupted. Dim thoughts of death began to open, and an idea that I was slowly sinking took gentle, and, somehow, not unwelcome possession of me. If it was sad, the tone of mind which this induced was also sweet. Whatever it might be, my soul acquiesced in it.
It's very rare that you get to play a character over the course of so many films. Bella meant a lot to me and she will always be such a formative event in my career. I grew up with her and she and I have been on this great journey together. I also see many parallels between her evolution and my own because I lived through so many things along the way while playing Bella and having this connection to so many people involved in making the films over the years. It would be impossible for me to separate my world from Bella's.
I have no idea who the characters are, later, their personalities take over anything I might want to do. I end up writing not from my own will, but from theirs-they come alive as I write and make me do things that I couldn't have planned.
'I Know You Care' is really personal and fragile for me. For me, it's about losing a family member and also about a breakup. It's about this idea of losing someone for good.
It might have been introduced slowly over the course of the years as you recall this memory over and over. So that was a very cool but complex idea that we thought about representing in the film but could not find a way to make it work.
My mom, who is a very strong Christian woman, will often ask me how some of the characters I play glorify God. Her meaning is that she feels as if every character should be a good Christian character, which is not necessarily my interpretation.
There's probably not any kind of music that means more to me than gospel and soul. I heard somebody say that soul music is being proud of where you're from and what you've accomplished, and letting that show. Losing some self-consciousness and ego to join something larger. I like that idea a lot, just letting it all hang out, and on this album we did our best at that.
I'm very objective about what I want to have happen to my protagonists and where that has to come from. On one hand, it does help me that I had a mother who might have taken the last dollar and bought a pack of cigarettes or something, but I also had a mother who exposed me to art, music, other religions, different foods. My mother was very adventurous in her own way, so she fed the part of me that was going to grow up to be a writer. But there's always, too, the opposite response that helps me to create.
One of the first memories I have was watching Whoopi Goldberg perform her one-woman show on Broadway on HBO. She moved seamlessly through an array of spirited and soul-stirring characters, each one holding a mirror up to me and allowing me in many ways to see a reflection of myself on screen.
I hated the summer jobs I had when I was a teenager. They were so mundane and repetitious, they deadened my soul. On the bright side, it was good training for this job.
The idea that you won't have a job is a real fear that people go through, so when people talk about jobs and say, 'I'm gonna create jobs!' or, 'There's gonna be a loss of jobs,' those are just words. But the reality of someone actually losing their job - I mean, it's their entire life for most people in this country.
Then God came to the woman and said to her, "Why did you not keep the commandment?" as if He wanted to say, "At least you, say forgive me, so as to humble your soul and to receive mercy." Again, there was no request for forgiveness. She also answered, "The serpent deceived me," as if she wanted to say, "If the serpent sinned, where is my mistake?"
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