James L. Brooks Quotes

But how shall I get ideas? ''Keep your wits open! Observe! Observe! Study! Study! But above all, Think! Think! And when a noble image is indelibly impressed upon the mind - Act!

I don't actually have a one wellspring of inspiration. Though I'm most often inspired while reading - both fiction and nonfiction. I subscribe to National Geographic, Scientific American, Discover, and a slew of other magazines. And it is while reading articles for pleasure and interest that an interesting 'What if?' will pop into my head.

People ask me, 'Don't you ever run out of ideas?' Well, on the first place, I don't use ideas. Every time I have an idea, it's too limiting and usually turns out to be a disappointment. But I haven't run out of curiosity.

I'm a big people watcher and a people talker. The beautiful thing about being an artist and a creative person is that you can get an idea from anywhere, and I'm always on the hunt for them.

You're bound to get idears if you go thinkin' about stuff

Of course, there will always be those who look only at technique, who ask 'how', while others of a more curious nature will ask 'why'. Personally, I have always preferred inspiration to information.

I have four or five ideas that just keep floating around and I want to kind of just let one - like a beautiful butterfly, let it land somewhere.

The capacity to be puzzled is the premise of all creation, be it in art or in science.

I have ideas whirring around my head all the time.

What you make up in your heads sticks if it's good, falls out if it's bad. If we still remember something a day after we made it up, it might be worth building on.

I like ideas. I find them more exciting than human behavior for the most part.

When I have an idea, I turn down the flame, as if it were a little alcohol stove, as low as it will go. Then it explodes and that is my idea.

At all times, think like a writer, and keep those antennae twitching - that way, you pick up new ideas.

I have ideas saved on my computer that I visit from time to time to see if one may shine and motivate me.

I'm not a sponge exactly, but I find that something I look at is a great opportunity for ideas.

A good question is never answered. It is not a bolt to be tightened into place but a seed to be planted and to bear more seed toward the hope of greening the landscape of idea.

Inspiration comes from everywhere. From life, observing people, etc. From movies and books you love. From research.

The nature of having ideas and creativity is incredibly inspiring.

Thinking is more interesting than knowing, but less interesting than looking.

It's amazing how ideas start out, isn't it?

All the things worth writing about are outside me. I'm a lens, not a source. And even if it's not always a comfortable journey, it's always a stimulating one.

At the root of everything I do is a fascination with ideas - what ideas are for, what jobs they do.

Writers are magpies by nature, always collecting shiny things, storing them away and looking for connections of things.

I think that's one of the greatest gifts you get if you're successful at something like music or film or photography - any of the arts - you can sit there and think. It's so much fun to sit there and think and wonder about the world and the universe.

I would worry if I wasn't coming up with ideas, if I wasn't inspired.