Stewart Butterfield Quotes

I spent the first 25 years of my life not knowing what I wanted to do.

Going into my 20s, I was uncertain, trying to figure out what my relationship to acting is.

Before 'Broad City,' I had a lot of jobs that I knew were not for me, but when you're young and don't know exactly what you're going to do, if an opportunity comes up, you feel like, 'This is an opportunity; I have to try it.'

I had these false ambitions - marketing and MBA. I didn't do very badly at it, but I realised my calling was something else.

I grew up always knowing what I wanted to do, and I'm starting to see how rare that is. All of my friends are just figuring it out. It's a process of elimination until you find what you love.

Never wanted to do anything else than acting ever in my life. But I'm 20, and there's so many possibilities. It would be insane for me to say, "Yeah this is definitely it, I'm never doing anything else." I'm 20 years old. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know anything about life. So I don't know. I may be a train conductor in 10 years. I have no idea. And that's the joy of this all.

I treaded water academically and spent much of my summertime as a camp counselor. It seemed a fun thing to do for a person in no way prepared to commit to a career path.

For a long time, I didn't know what I wanted to be when I grew up. I was desperate to find something that fit me and I just decided that if I could organically make a professional living out of the things that interested me, then I would be a happy person.

I know a lot of people my age are still trying to figure out what to do, and I consider myself lucky that I can make a living doing something that I truly enjoy.

In school, you get a limited view of the world. Start working. Find your passion. Take your time doing that. Once you've found what you're passionate about, then lock down. Even if you want to start a business, it's helpful to work, see how other businesses are run.

I don't have a big career plan. I just like to see how things come out, and I just try to keep going in different directions.

I had no idea what I wanted to be when I was 17. I just knew I wanted to be something larger than myself.

I have a really wide range of interests and I've still got time to work out my exact direction.

I don't know what drives me. I need to work. I wanted to be in the entertainment field, but I didn't know what.

When I started with 'Cocktail,' I was trying to figure out if this was something I wanted to do.

I had no clue what I wanted to do. I tried nursing, I tried science, I tried English. I just kept bouncing back and forth.

I'm so jealous of people who in second grade knew what they wanted to do.

Growing up, I would think I want to do this, I want to do that. You change your mind a million times.

I think when you are young and you don't really know what you want in life, you can commit to something and think at the time it is right.

My mom just wanted me to do anything that was academic, whether it was become a doctor or be a lawyer. Engineering suited her... then I dropped out. It was not what I wanted to do at all; it just felt so unnatural, and I couldn't put my finger on why. I just knew it wasn't for me.

A less-than dream job can help you find your dreams.

I was just sort of young and went with the flow. It wasn't like I was 6 and knew I wanted to be an actor. I was thinking more along the lines of, I'm 6. When I was 20 I realized, I've never really thought about what I want to do. So I took a bunch of time off, stopped answering my phone, stopped doing anything. I'm pretty sure this is what I want to do, but I needed to be sure. It took me about two years to come around.

Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your life…the most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives, some of the most interesting 40 year olds I know still don’t.

The younger you are, the more experimenting you should do. But once you've found what you were created to do, stick with it.

I think the most important advice is, a person doesn't have to find out right away. It's not like their first attempt at finding a profession is the only one they're going to find. I might well have gone down other paths, and it still might have been okay. But if you find something that you love, and if it keeps deepening with each new experience, then just stay with it.