Carrie Preston Quotes

Why do writers, say, give up a job in economics and decide to write poetry? Or, why do they give up a job in a bank and decide to paint, like Krishan Khanna? They want to convey something.

I'm one of those people who thinks you can have a happy life and still be an artist.

I'm doing what I do for the right reasons. I love the music that I make.

I don't think the goal is, 'How big a star did you ever become?' I think the goal is, 'Were you able to express yourself?'

I am interested in art as a means of living a life; not as a means of making a living.

Now my drug is writing or acting, being creative.

I find contentment in the craft of writing and fulfillment in self-expression.

I make music not to make money but because it's in me.

If I don't create, I don't exist.

I didn't have a career; I made films. It's very different.

Everything has always been so organic for me; I have no idea what I would be doing if it wasn't for music. Music forever!

I get to do my own thing with music. I get to write the songs and sing the songs. As an actor, you have to do what someone else tells you to do and say someone else's words. And you're limited by the way you look and music is just more rewarding creatively for me.

The art helps, between the acting gigs. I feel that if I can sing in Mamma Mia! then goddammit, I can hang a few paintings, give people lots of cocktails, and have a good time.

I try not to think about the idea of reaching more and more people, because once you get in that mindset, I think you lose the point of why you're doing it in the first place. Still, the best feeling I ever get is when I finish a song, and it exists, and it didn't exist before, and now it's there, and it makes me feel a certain way.

To me acting is a hobby and I'm inspired by it. And if I'm going to spend time doing something that I'm not really inspired to do, then why am I doing it? I don't know if that sounds sort of new agey or whatever, but it's true. I've been lucky enough to have a musical career that has gone pretty good and acting is something I have always wanted to do.

As much as I love being an artist, I love being a mom even more.

If you go into acting to make money then you're an idiot. It's my hobby and the fact that I'm doing my hobby for a job is mental.

It is not the act of making art that is painful. It is the desire to make something and not acting on it that causes pain....A day when I don't write is less happy. This is not discipline. It is affection, enthusiasm, adventure-any number of other words besides discipline.

I've been lucky to have things come to me that creatively fulfill me, and those are usually the independent films just because you have a little bit more freedom.

The thing about being a writer is that you never have to ask, 'Am I doing something that's worthwhile?' Because even if you fail at it, you know that it's worth doing.

That is my reality. It's that important to nurture and foster my own creativity. There are plenty of birthday parties I haven't been able to go to, weddings I haven't been able to go to because I've been working. Those are things that have not been easy to give up, but at the same time, it is my reality. It's my responsibility.

I retired from acting the same time they stopped hiring me. But following my own thing of making these small indie movies has been the happiest I've ever been.

I am working here (in Amsterdam) on my last big triptych, which will be a tremendous story, and which gives me a more intense life and exhilaration. My God, life is worth living!

I never thought in terms of a "breakthrough" film. I wasn't looking for fame or a career path into Hollywood. I was doing it for myself. I just wanted to make a film that I really loved. If other people liked it, great. But you can never guess what other people are going to like.

I like the fact that I can go away and lose myself so I don't have to live in the world of courage that everyone else does. I like creating, it's what I do, and acting allows me to stretch all those different muscles in all kinds of ways. That's pretty cool.