Anais Nin Quotes

I feel that by writing I am doing what is far more necessary than anything else.

I write for no other purpose than to add to the beauty that now belongs to me.

You are going to have to give and give and give, or there's no reason for you to be writing. You have to give from the deepest part of yourself, and you are going to have to go on giving, and the giving is going to have to be its own reward. There is no cosmic importance to your getting something published, but there is in learning to be a giver.

Nobody will stop you from creating. Do it tonight. Do it tomorrow. That is the way to make your soul grow - whether there is a market for it or not! The kick of creation is the act of creating, not anything that happens afterward. I would tell all of you watching this screen: Before you go to bed, write a four line poem. Make it as good as you can. Don't show it to anybody. Put it where nobody will find it. And you will discover that you have your reward.

I'm going to continue writing. I'll always be a storyteller. But I'm also taking time to enjoy my life.

I make art, sometimes I make true art, and sometimes it fills the empty places in my life. Some of them. Not all.

Some writers, of course, simply write, as they feel they are driven to do, by outer/inner inspirations. If, after the work is written and, hopefully, published, others respond -- that is the Champagne. But we, or some of us, don't write for the Champagne. We write because we write.

It is not in life, but in art that self-fulfillment is to be found.

I don't think the goal is, 'How big a star did you ever become?' I think the goal is, 'Were you able to express yourself?'

But where there is no art show, I would still be painting.

I didn't have any concept of Trainspotting being published. It was a selfish act. I did it for myself.

I want to make words out of life. That's bigger than me. That's as big a creative force as - bigger than, for me, even having children. That felt more accidental - wonderful, but accidental.

Art was - and is - my biggest outlet. I'd probably die if I didn't do it.

My art completes my life.

The purpose of art is to accumulate the human within the human being.

If I'm not writing, I'm not fully living. It has become the essential element that defines who I am.

When you start to think of the arts as not this thing that is going to get you somewhere in terms of becoming an artist or becoming famous or whatever it is that people do, but rather a way of making being in the world not just bearable, but fascinating, then it starts to get interesting again.

The actual act of writing brings me such pleasure - to tell stories, to engage in cultural criticism, to reflect, to question, all of it is invigorating.

I'm only really alive when I'm writing.

I think what I love most [about writing] is that feeling that you really nailed something. Sometimes with a line you feel that it really captured what it is that you had inside you and you got it out for a stranger to read, someone who may never love you or meet you, but he or she is going to get that experience from that line.

Writing, at its best and truest, can offer solace and salvation for both readers and writers.

I know definitive points in my life and in relationships because of my songs. I write my music so that I'll never be bored of it.

Not writing would be like going the rest of your life without having dreams.

I'm writing for the sake of writing music. Whether it gets heard or not isn't an issue for me. It keeps my own juices going and my mind active.

Writing is its own reward.