A Quote by Samuel Ervin Beam

I feel like anytime you write about people in an honest way, you can find connections to any issue you would like. — © Samuel Ervin Beam
I feel like anytime you write about people in an honest way, you can find connections to any issue you would like.
We have this huge discourse on family in this country, but no one deconstructs it the same way. People talk about "the American family." The right wing has this thing - Focus on the Family. What the hell is that? I don't want to just discuss the issues - I want family to be a real part of the character of the novels I write, and I don't like to write things that feel like issue books.
I'm not the type to generalise about an entire generation. I think the most general thing I can say, is that things are way more dispersed, and way more de-centralised than they were twenty years ago. I don't really feel like people talk about my generation the way people would talk about Generation X in their early 90's when Nirvana blew up. I feel like there was an easier, more coherent narrative to find, than you can now.
I had so many people in my family with dementia that it felt like it belonged to me in a way. I feel like the same with teenage depression because I went through it. I feel like I'm allowed to write about it; it's mine.
I personally feel that there's a lot of music journalism that is dominated by genre, because you need a language in which to write, but actually the things that strike people about music, are very hard to write about, and its sonic connections, it's a sense of harmony that I think we all have even if we don't know how to express it - it's something musical, it's synapse connections in our brain.
I love to write when I feel like everybody else is asleep and when I feel like the world is kind of empty in some ways. I find, oddly enough, that I write about loneliness and isolation a lot.
You do try to write songs that you feel like people can relate to and you try to be as honest as you can so that people hear your records and they feel like, "Oh, my god. This is exactly how I feel. I went through this."
To be honest, I’m more concerned with living my life than writing about my life. I feel like that’s really the main thing I know now that I didn’t know when I was younger — and that is that you have to have a life to write about one. If you’re more worried about having experiences so you can write about them, I think you’re kinda being ridiculous, and I think a lot of young people look at it like that.
I always find it kind of more interesting when people ask questions like, "What were you like as a kid?" Or just kind of personal history stuff, like, "What was the lowest point of your life?" Because that would be like, "Huh, well, I'd have to think about that one." And then give an honest answer. I think a lot of people don't want to give honest answers, or they just are in business showbiz mode when they're talking about stuff, so that's probably why a lot of that kind of thing doesn't get asked.
Abuse of any kind thrives off secrecy. I felt like if I started talking about it, maybe other people would. I wanted to break the silence. Now I feel I'm in a much better place emotionally than I've ever been anytime in my life.
You should write songs about what you feel, but you can't write in such a way like it's a diary entry. You should write it in a way that people understand in their lives.
I'm somebody who, if I went to the grocery store, and one of them wasn't with me, I would feel guilty. I would be like, 'I shouldn't be doing anything without them, anytime, ever.' A very codependent way of thinking. Also, motherhood is hugely about guilt.
I don't really see how any song can not feel contrived if it isn't honest, and how could I write honest songs if I don't write about stuff going on in my life and how I'm feeling?
I just feel like there's something to be said about feeling comfortable with what you have and don't have. And - for instance, I don't think I'm particularly a great singer, but I feel like I write songs that complement my voice, you know, and I feel like it's unique. And I don't feel like I'm particularly a great actor, for instance, but I feel like I approach each thing that I do with some level of sensitivity. And I would say that comedy in general is the most disarming.
I like to write about relationships. I like it when my friends come over and we crowd around the piano and sing Journey songs at the top of our lungs... And I like things that make me feel seven again. I don't ever look down on people for the way they choose to have fun; it's just not necessarily the way I like to have fun.
I'm trying to write truthfully about life, and naturalism, or the way people normally talk in movies, is a convention. The way I write is about life and is quite truthful, and there is a kind of brutal side to the relationship, and to the feelings, that makes it somewhat painful, but I think it's a very intense portrait of the relationship of two people. And a bit about what people feel like when they're alone, because it all takes place in one day, and during the day, they spend a lot of time alone in their different - you get to imagine what their fantasy lives are like.
I feel like I was transformed by the kindness of people who had every reason to show me cruelty and the transformative power of their decision to treat me like a human being, that was so huge, that anytime somebody wants me to talk about that I feel like I absolutely want to do that.
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