A Quote by Penn Jillette

In my run-ins with Christians... I find that they really are good moral people. And we overlap on everything, and they don't seem to be the kind of people that are waiting to hear voices to tell them what to do.
I really like writing music. That's kind of like my little hobby. I like that because sometimes you don't really have any control when you're an actor, over what you're doing next, and everything is kind of decided by other people. You're always waiting to hear from people.
I now understand what Nelle Morton meant when she said that one of the great tasks in our time is to "hear people to speech." Behind their fearful silence, our students want to find their voices, speak their voices, have their voices heard. A good teacher is one who can listen to those voices even before they are spoken-so that someday they can speak with truth and confidence.
I do what I believe the Lord did, and that is walk in love with all mankind, which I don't see a lot of Christians doing. Christians can be so judgmental, that it can turn off people who are considering converting. It makes me a little embarrassed, to tell you the truth, when I hear Christians criticizing others. I have to fight against being discouraged, because I don't want to be connected with people who are so intolerant of much of mankind like that. God loves us all. He really does. And I want to walk in love with people.
There are too many over-fed, under-motivated Christians hiding behind the excuse that God has not spoken to them. They are waiting to hear voices or see dreams - all the while living to make money, to provide for their future, to dress well and have fun.
I simply couldn’t conceive of how devastating it would be not to be able to hear my children’s voices. Not to be able to communicate with them, to hear them learn, grow, and express themselves verbally. How fortunate, how blessed I am. This overwhelmed me. I can talk to my children, I can respond to their needs and comfort them when they tell me they are unwell. I can tell them stories and hear them tell theirs.
I do what I believe the Lord did, and that is walk in love with all mankind, which I don't see a lot of Christians doing. Christians can be so judgmental that it can turn off people who are considering converting. It makes me a little embarrassed, to tell you the truth, when I hear Christians criticizing others.
Sometimes people hear that you help somebody or you said something that really resonated with them that they really needed to hear. Sometimes people get motivated to go and do stuff. That makes me feel really good because I feel like I'm affecting people in a good way.
These bible people remind me of another calamity similar to this missionary scheme, when our people, or any christian power would go to Africa for the pious purpose of kidnapping negroes, the mother would cry out to her children "run, run, the christians are coming," so when ever you hear "bibles," run for your life, if you do not want your pockets picked, or to be insulted and slandered as I was... and if you hear "hopeful conversions" or the "gospel," don't stop to look behind you.
Often I hear people say they do not have time to read. That's absolute nonsense. In the one year during which I kept that kind of record, I read twenty-five books while waiting for people. In offices, applying for jobs, waiting to see a dentist, waiting in a restaurant for friends, many such places.
Too often, when you are close to people in power, you're trying to make them happy; you're trying to tell them what they want to hear. But I find that really good leaders don't want that. They want the truth. And you do them a service, and yourself a service, by just being honest and straightforward.
I really don't have that many run-ins. People by and large are very nice to me.
People probably have different philosophies about this, but I think that when you're first shaping the play and trying to find a character, the initial actors that develop it end up imprinting on it - you hear their voices; you hear their rhythms. You can't help but to begin to write toward them during the rehearsal process.
Be undeniably good. When people ask me how do you make it in show business or whatever, what I always tell them & nobody ever takes note of it 'cause it's not the answer they wanted to hear-what they want to hear is here's how you get an agent, here's how you write a script, here's how you do this-but I always say, “Be so good they can't ignore you.” If somebody's thinking, “How can I be really good?” people are going to come to you. It's much easier doing it that way than going to cocktail parties.
Much of the message that I try to put across to students is that they have to figure out what they really like to do and find a way to do that as an adult for their jobs. A lot of people have jobs they don't like, and it makes for very unhappy people. So I tell them if you like to write, or run around, or dig in the dirt, then find a job that will allow you to do that, and you'll be happy.
It's in the silence that I'm most able to hear the tiny voices that tell me I'm not good enough, smart enough, or cool enough. I try to hear them for what they are: my own creations. Sitting with them, letting them speak, hearing them out, and giving them back the silence that I'm now sitting in has shown me that, quite often, they shut up.
When you've always worked hard in the theatre, you find that, when you stop playing, at the end of a run, the evenings seem very long indeed. You have to find something to keep yourself occupied with because you're so used to gearing yourself up to that eight o'clock curtain, but to find any kind of real, absorbing alternative is impossible. Nobody is as interesting to spend an evening with as a really good part.
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