Raekwon Quotes

The biggest threat to a better life is the desire to keep the future under control - to make the world predictable by reining in creativity and enterprise. Progress as a neat blueprint, with no deviations and no surprise, may work in children's cartoons or utopian novels. But it's just a fantasy.

I don't plan. I don't think, 'I have to do this kind of part 'cause I've done that kind of part.' I'm not a very good planner.

When I was younger, I talked to the adults around me that I respected most about how they got where they were, and none of them plotted a course they could have predicted, so it seemed a waste of time to plan too long-term. Since then, I've always gone on my instincts.

Mistrust first impulses; they are nearly always good.

My whole life has been one big improvisation.

I think that's the thing I learned at 'Saturday Night Live' - any time I would try and strategize, I would always, always fall on my face. Things worked out when I tried to make it about what I was feeling at that moment and what I was into in that moment of my life.

I don't plan a career. That doesn't work for me. I just have to go with my gut.

I don't play chess with my life, ya' know.

It's important not to think too much about what you do.

Sometimes I'm wrong, sometimes not. But I'm an instinctual player.

These are days when no one should rely unduly on his competence. Strength lies in improvisation. All the decisive blows are struck left-handed.

I know for sure that nothing is guaranteed. Life always changes. I know for sure that I'm open to all possibilities always... let's just say my life is never boring.

I think there are actors who are like, 'Okay, what am I doing, how am I doing it, what's the appeal? Tell me what to do, what are the exact lines from the script? Okay, I got it.' I am not that way. I would be a terrible bus driver. I'd want to be like, 'Oh, let's take this side road! Let's see what happens when we go down this back alley.'

The apparatus has to serve our improbability and improvisation. Being good and playing the songs is not enough.

I'm not that in control of myself that I could be specific about exactly the way I'm doing everything as it happens. I'm just trying my best.

Everything I do in my life is very instinctual and in the moment. If I'm attracted to something, that's it. If I have reservations, those don't change till they're resolved. My first impression is how I go.

Good-faith re-examination of a position you've held in the past should be seen as a virtue, not a vice.

As an idea occurs to me, I'll either follow it or not, but I'm more instinctive than master-planner about stuff.

The problem as you get older... is that you become more self-aware. At the same time, you have to surprise yourself. There's no way of arranging the surprise, so it is tricky.

I've never had a plan, I've always done things from instinct.

I'm a very spontaneous person, for the bad and the good.

I think it's important to talk to your inner thing. The purpose is to go over the decisions that will affect my life and others. I pray that I don't make my decisions based on ego.

I don't really plan. I'm almost intuitive about things.

I research every part thoroughly. I talk it out with my actor friends, but then I throw it all away when I get to the set. You have to be spontaneous.

We don't hold anything back. We go for broke, and if we have a good idea for a story line, we just use it because you never know and because the dynamics of the show are going to change.