T. J. Perkins Quotes

You realize yourself when you start reflecting - because I don't live in the past, although your past is so much a part of what you are - that you can't ignore it. But I don't look at scrapbooks.

Sometimes you make a record that is what you want to hear. I've made a couple of those, idealized creations of what I wanted to hear. Then there are records that are what you feel.

I can't picture myself being the people I always looked up to.

We need role models who are going to break the mold.

I think that all stories - if you make movies about zombies and aliens - it has always to do with your personal story. If not directly, it is about your fears, your obsessions, things like that.

I've always wanted to be on an original cast recording. I grew up listening to them, and now to know that my voice is heard on three or four of them is just surreal. I never thought I would be that person.

My mother had a saying: 'Kamala, you may be the first to do many things, but make sure you're not the last.'

I remember meeting President Obama and looking at him, thinking, 'Damn, this dude is really our president. He really went out and did it!' If you look at stories like that, and other stories that I'm sure you could compare to, it's just about freeing your mind and taking those guards down.

Why stop now when I'm just getting the hang of it?

With ideas it is like with dizzy heights you climb: At first they cause you discomfort and you are anxious to get down, distrustful of your own powers; but soon the remoteness of the turmoil of life and the inspiring influence of the altitude calm your blood; your step gets firm and sure and you begin to look - for dizzier heights.

I think it's the end of progress if you stand still and think of what you've done in the past. I keep on.

I think it's important to move people beyond just dreaming into doing. They have to be able to see that you are just like them, and you made it.

I get star-struck anytime I meet performers that I grew up watching and appreciating. I mean, it's still incredibly surreal to me that I was a kid in San Antonio watching movies and then now I'm working with some of the people that were in those movies. I don't think it'll ever stop being surreal on some level.

People seldom improve when they have no other model but themselves to copy.

The dream is to keep surprising yourself, never mind the audience.

You can really do more than you think you can do.

I admire many people, but I am not sure that I have any 'heroes.'

You don't learn from good people - they've found what works for them and are completely original; you learn from the people who are bad. You think: 'Oh dear, I'm not going to do that.'

I never tire of the heroes that I knew growing up.

All great people glorify their history and look back upon their early attainments with a spiritualized vision.

Like all children, I spent a lot of time looking for idols.

If I can sit on national television, and people are listening to what I think, anyone can do anything.

My heroes are not necessarily people of great ability but ones who did what I think I could not.

I never thought acting would be a realistic job for me. Because, quite frankly, I didn't see people who looked like me doing it. I quickly realized, that's all the more reason to try.

When you break glass ceilings, you're going to get minor scrapes by a shard or two from the glass.