A Quote by Sonny Rollins

Improvisation is really not so much remembering things. And this is what I do when I play. I forget things. When I go on the stage, I want my mind to be a blank, so that I can - things can come into me without my knowing where they came from.
It isn't a hunch but the subconscious mind, which is the creative mind, at work. That is the mind which makes artists do things without their knowing how they came to do them. Perhaps with me it was the cumulative effect of a lot of little things individually insignificant but collectively powerful.
I come from nothing. Growing up I didn't really have too much, and I can tap into that anytime that I want to and just remember how bad things were for me growing up and just knowing that I never want to go back there and I don't want my kids to go through it.
Taking care of my parents is one of the things that I want to do, just give them some of the things that we never had a chance to have. It's all about remembering where I came fromt.
There is what Steve Blank calls the stage where you are searching for a scalable business model. Then, there is the stage when you have found that model and need to scale it. In the former stage you have to have a "beginner's mind," be in learning mode, and expect to learn things you didn't anticipate.
The only thing I know that makes me feel comfortable is to know as much as I can. Not like what the shots are going to be, but knowing enough about my character that I can forget those things. And more specifically, my lines. I have to know my lines. I have to know something really well, so I can forget it when we're doing it. And there is comfort in knowing, "Okay, there's not another stone that I could have overturned."
I used to just let people tell me what to do. I didn't really have a mind of my own, and I couldn't really say yes or no to things because I didn't really know what I wanted, but now I feel really confident in the fact that I can really be distinctive on what I want and how I want to do things.
Many people in Western culture are striving for success. They want the home, they want the great business. They want all of these outer things. But what we found in our research is that having those things, certainly doesn't guarantee what we really want, which is happiness. And that's when all those outer things come. They don't come from going after them first to get the happiness, it's backwards; you go for the sense of inner joy, of inner peace, of inner vision first and then all of the other things from the outside appear.
I try not to think of myself in any category, and I don't ever really try to imagine myself competing with another actor. I just know I want to do the things that I would want to see, and I know the things that turn me on, whether it's on the stage, or it's a play or a film. I just kind of want to keep doing my own thing.
Good writing is remembering detail. Most people want to forget. Don't forget things that were painful or embarrassing or silly. Turn them into a story that tells the truth.
Happiness does not come from the things that we have but the abandoning of things that we cling to, by letting go of the attachments to things we don't want.
Trust the young people; trust this generation's innovation. They're making things, changing innovation every day. And all the consumers are the same: they want new things, they want cheap things, they want good things, they want unique things. If we can create these kind of things for consumers, they will come.
But one of the things I learned from improvising is that all of life is an improvisation, whether you like it or not. Some of the greatest scientific discoveries of the 20th century came out of people dropping things.
We knew what it was like to go without a lot of things, but we didn't mind, because we were going without those things together.
Inspiration is the most valuable commodity for an artist; it is for me anyway. I can't move forward in any way if I don't feel a strong spark of excitement or creativity. Sometimes it is very difficult to get things flowing. It's important to be in a peaceful state of mind, and then I invite the spirits to come into the studio. I don't stare into a blank canvas or paper. I look through my various collections of books, toys, statues, photographs and other things, and something will trigger an idea. My studio is packed full of things that inspire me.
Knowing things halfway is a greater success than knowing things completely: it takes things to be simpler than they really are andso makes its opinions more easily understandable and persuasive.
Sometimes the characters develop almost without your knowing it. You find them doing things you hadn't planned on, and then I have to go back to page 42 and fix things. I'm not recommending it as a way to write. It's very sloppy, but it works for me.
This site uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience. More info...
Got it!