Michael Stipe Quotes

I don't like touring and it seemed to be getting on top of me in a big way.

I completely bombed the audition... I was insecure, stopping and starting. I went to the bathroom and cried.

Sometimes I'll be telling my husband, 'I think I'm cracking up'. Sometimes you just need a minute to say, 'I think I'm cracking' and just acknowledge it.

I had panic attacks during rehearsal. There were times when I really thought I wasn't going to be able to do it.

Stress is something that is sort of out of your control. You get stressed out over looking at the finish line. Stress is something that is an outside thing. Stress is an anxiety.

I still start to get panicky each morning before I go on television. I'll say, 'I'm in awful shape, something is wrong,' and if I start to look like I'm going off the deep end, Jimmy Straka, the stage manager, will say, 'You're all right. Calm down.' Then Bryant Gumbel will grab me by the leg or something.

I would just sweat so much. I'd be dry when I run on the stage. By the time I got in front of the microphone, it just, just like a river pouring out. I don't know what made that happen. It took five years for that to stop happening to me.

I do have panic attacks every time I go on stage so I'm really not sure why I put myself through this.

Barbra Streisand developed overwhelming performance anxiety at the height of her career; for 27 years she refused to perform for the general public, appearing live only in private clubs and at charity events, where she presumably believed the pressure on her was less intense.

We need to distinguish between stress and stimulation. Having deadlines, setting goals, and pushing yourself to perform at capacity are stimulating. Stress is when you're anxious, upset, or frustrated, which dramatically reduce your ability to perform.

I don't wake up drenched in sweat because I haven't been on stage in years.

Generally I can sleep any time, anywhere, any place, unless I'm anxious about work. I can get performance anxiety, so when I'm on tour it can be hard to sleep.

I'm scared of audiences. One show in Amsterdam I was so nervous, I escaped out the fire exit. I've thrown up a couple of times. Once in Brussels, I projectile vomited on someone. I just gotta bear it. But I don't like touring. I have anxiety attacks a lot.

When I was younger and did a stand-up gig, it would take me two weeks to recover. Sometimes I'd get so panicked that I would stutter.

I suffer a lot with nerves and stage fright.

I have had a very difficult time with stage fright; it undermines your well-being and peace of mind, and it can also threaten your livelihood.

I suffer greatly from nerves. I have stage-fright badly, and it gets worse, but the stage is still my life.

I think when we use 'stress', we are often using a kind of dummy word to try to fit many different things into one big category.

Anyway, I collapsed in France in the middle of a tour. I hadn't been eating properly, I was getting very phobic about audiences, and I collapsed in pure fright.

My departure from Hollywood was described as a walk-out. No one understood that I was cracking up.

Nick can get up on stage and just wing it, whereas I would have to be taken to a mental institution.

I have this absurd syndrome where I get these out-of-the-blue, pathetic panic attacks. It'll be in a very easy, simple scene when everything is going swimmingly, and then suddenly, bang, I'm shvitzing and can't remember my lines.

I suffer from a more complex, persistent fear. It manifests itself in nerves, and on film the camera sees even the tiniest evidence of this. So you have to learn that when the director calls 'Action,' you don't go to this place of tension, but somehow you become free.

I feel like I've paid a really heavy cost, a really heavy physical health cost, for the years of touring and how physical I've been onstage.

Sometimes, musicians worry too much about how beautifully they are playing.