Claire Messud Quotes

If your dreams don't scare you, you aren't dreaming big enough.

Everybody wants to be perfect.

I've got a lot of crazy plans.

I always look at a group of people who want to attempt an enterprise greater than their means. They begin on this enterprise and they fail.

Whoever thinks a faultless piece to see, Thinks what ne'er was, nor is, nor e'er shall be.

I knew I wanted to play 'Dr Cox' really bad, which is always a huge mistake because as soon as you want something really bad, maybe you rip up a little bit.

You can criticize something you strive for, and you can avoid something you dream about.

I'm definitely attracted to the idea of people that have these big aspirations that the audience know might never happen, but they're lost in them.

You'll go insane if you try to have a picture-book house.

You have to think anyway, so why not think big?

We're looking for people who are working on things that seem out of reach, uncomfortably difficult.

Luckily, unreasonable expectations go hand in hand with naive young scientists. The more naive the better - otherwise we would never have the audacity to try and build a 22,000-mile-high space elevator or some sprawling underwater hotel.

I do have impossibly high standards.

I don't believe in perfection. I don't think there is such a thing. But the energy of wanting things to be great is a perfectionist energy.

Dream a big dream, a bold dream. Don't play conservatively between the 40 yard lines. Don't just play it safe.

I don't think there's any such thing as perfection. But I'm a perfectionist. I don't believe in the idea of perfection, but I will strive to achieve it.

The size of your dreams must always exceed your current capacity to achieve them. If your dreams do not scare you, they are not big enough.

I rose too high, loved too hard, dared too much. I tried to grasp a star, overreached, and fell.

gold never comes to the dreamers - except in dreams.

The impossible is the least that one can demand.

Any system which allows men to choose their own future will end by choosing safety and mediocrity, and in such a Reality the stars are out of reach.

To have big success, you must have big dreams, and you must be willing to take a chance.

The maxims tell you to aim at perfection, which is well; but it's unattainable, all the same.

Reaching for the stars, perfectionists may end up clutching at air.

Don't be afraid to fail big, to dream big.