Robert Henri Quotes

The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.

It's not the daily increase but daily decrease. Hack away at the unessential.

Avoid trivia.

Acting is about listening, and that's something that took me awhile. You almost don't have to learn your lines, if you listen to what they're saying and move it along.

My mouth has gone dry as sawdust. I desperately find Cinna in the crowd and lock eyes with him. I imagine the words coming from his lips. 'What's impressed you most since you arrived here?' I rack my brain for something that made me happy here. Be honest, I think. Be honest.

The secret of the truly successful ... is that they learned early in life how not to be busy.

Be brief, for no talk can please when too long. Being prepared is half the victory.

You should focus on being more interested than interesting.

To make a relationship work, focus on what you appreciate about the other person, and not your complaints.

If you want your life to have impact, focus it! Stop dabbling. Stop trying to do it all. Do less. Prune away even good activities and do only that which matters most. Never confuse activity with productivity. You can be busy without a purpose, but what's the point?

For me writing is like breathing. I could not live without breathing and I could not live without writing.

Isn't it amazing how much better you listen when you are in need?

You can't be focussed without really great communication

How do you achieve excellence?...Stop doing non-excellent stuff!

Words are like eyeglasses they blur everything that they do not make clear.

True listening is another way of bringing stillness into the relationship. When you truly listen to someone, the dimension of stillness arises and becomes an essential part of the relationship. But true listening is a rare skill. Usually, the greater part of a person's attention is taken up by their thinking. At best, they may be evaluating your words or preparing the next thing to say. Or they may not be listening at all, lost in their own thoughts.

Don't focus on what I'm wearing. Focus on what's coming out of my face.

If you don't stick to your plan enough, and you're too seduced by whimsical notions and new ideas, you can kind of lose your train of thought and end up with something that doesn't have a solid through-line.

I feel more productive, mostly because I feel like my ass is on the line. Before I had kids, I would sit around, drink, I don't even know what I did with myself.

A man were better relate himself to a statue or picture than to suffer his thoughts to pass in smother.

If you have a clear goal and a plan to achieve it, your focus is fixed on a set course of action. Instead of becoming sidetracked by distractions and diversions, your time is focused on a straight line from start to finish.

If a man takes off his sunglasses I can hear him better.

It's better to go slowly in the right direction than go speeding off in the wrong direction.

You write to be read. That is the bottom line.

We don't drift into good directions. We discipline and prioritize ourselves there.