Julianna Baggott Quotes

Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.

Why wouldn't you write to escape yourself as much as you might write to express yourself? It's far more interesting to write about others.

Certainly, I devote my energy to both telling my personal life story and seeking self- obliteration. However, I will not destroy myself through art.

Part of the very impulse of writing for me is actually wanting to get away from myself.

When we're growing up there are all sorts of people telling us what to do when really what we need is space to work out who to be.

You discover yourself through the research of your work.

I want to explore more sides of humanity and myself. That's what acting is about.

I'm going to keep on finding out the kind of man I am through my music. That's the one place I can be free. But the reason it's difficult is because I'm changing all the time.

I don't like work... but I like what is in work - the chance to find yourself. Your own reality - for yourself, not for others - which no other man can ever know.

I'm not out trying to prove anything. I'm sort of finished with that, so I get to play in other sandboxes and try and figure out what I like and I'm interested in.

I'm not goal-oriented so much as I'm constantly aware of what I'm passionate about, and I'm constantly updating the list. I envision many possible futures for myself where I could be happy, so I just try to keep my passions alive.

Training readers to expect a voice or subject matter from me would interfere with the reinvention I crave. At the same time, I feel almost too able to disappear at times.

'Shortcomings' was me figuring out who I am.

Our works are the mirror wherein the spirit first sees its natural lineaments. Hence, too, the folly of that impossible precept, Know theyself; till it be translated into this partially possible one, know what thou canst work at.

I'm not interested in nostalgia; I'm interested in who I am.

If you really want to know yourself, start by writing a book.

People have to learn who they are - you can't have somebody else telling you who you are.

The autobiographical doesn't interest me. I could think of few things less interesting than rooting about in my life.

I guess I had a suspicion of it my entire life without knowing exactly what it was - knowing that there was something different about me, which I attributed to being an artist. At 11 or 12 I started sort of clarifying for myself. It took a while.

I think if we didn't contradict ourselves, it would be awfully boring. It would be tedious to be alive.

My physical transformations - like changing my hair - are usually a reflection of what's inspiring me at the moment.

Everything we know by heart enriches us and helps us find ourselves. If it should get in the way of finding ourselves, it is because we have no personality.

I remember the first time I went to Europe, I had someone take a picture of me there, so I could really see myself there. There's a sense of being outside yourself, and I think celebrity allows us that too, to be outside ourselves.

Writing is a really good first step toward that goal of knowing yourself.

If you're open to it, New Orleans will teach you about yourself, but if you want to hide from who you really are, the city will help you do that, too.