Bea Miller Quotes

I feel like my competition is everything else that's competing for people's attention, not just other print magazines, newspapers and cable. It's your kid's report card and the games you want to play, all the things that compete for people's time.

One of the problems of modern society, or the post-Internet age, is that there are so many things bombarding us that we could care about. I think it's more important than ever to really get clear and focus on what's worth caring about and what's just noise or distraction.

It comes down to a question of attention: it's difficult to use the Net distractedly, unlike the television or the radio.

I get more distracted by hair or a really bad wig than I do costumes any day of the week.

The average human attention span was 12 seconds in 2000 and 8 seconds in 2013. A drop of 33%. The scary part is that the attention span of a goldfish was 9 seconds, almost 13% more than us humans. That's why it's getting tougher by the day to get people to turn the page. Maybe we writers ought to try writing for goldfish!

I listen to music constantly while writing.

I find that I can't work and listen to radio - either I find I don't like it and it distracts me, or I do like it and I want to listen to it.

A lot of painters listen to music, I think, while they paint. But I hate to do that. It's a horror. I can't really listen to the music. I'm not really concentrating on it, and I'm not really concentrating on the painting.

Attention is the material I work with.

My concentration span is truly that of a gnat. Some people have this ladder, and that's all there is - the ladder. I have the ladder, too, but there's a building around it with scaffolding, and lots of windows for me to peek into. Then suddenly I'll remember, 'Oh, there's the ladder. I should be concentrating on that.'

To be honest, I don't enjoy watching movies much when I'm working. They tend to fall apart on me a bit.

I'm bored way too easily. I'm staring at screens half the day. I need to be overstimulated. And how will that express itself artistically?

We live in such an age of chatter and distraction. Everything is a challenge for the ears and eyes.

I need to have something else going on. I'm able to write a lot if I have an episode of 'Friday Night Lights' going on my computer.

I'm very easily distracted unless I have music on. Listening to music while I brainstorm makes me think of scenes that would fit the mood of the music I'm playing.

These days you're not just competing with the tedium, you're competing with the cellphone.

I'm very focused when I'm making a movie, but I'm also a fantastic multitasker.

Sure, one can always get the students to relax and be happy - entertained, but although being laid back and relax can also lead to creativity, mostly it means that nothing much gets done.

In my studio, it is unkempt and unattractive. Once I'm in my work, I don't notice where I am.

I like big crowds. I find it easier to focus.

I don't think you go to a play to forget, or to a movie to be distracted. I think life generally is a distraction and that going to a movie is a way to get back, not go away.

The only factor becoming scarce in a world of abundance is human attention.

I have a short attention span. I couldn't stay doing the same thing for 30 years.

I don't have the attention span for sports.

If there is something that strikes me as interesting or beautiful or something I could learn from, and I don't write it down, then I could be at lunch with you, and it's like there's a pile of laundry in my brain that I haven't put away, and I struggle to really listen, so that's always been important to me.