John Darnielle Quotes

I believe that a creative career is only as good as the risks that you take with it.

A lot of people in Hollywood, and everywhere pretty much, operate on fear. No one wants to get fired, so everyone's scared to take a chance. There's money involved, and there are careers and reputations on the line.

During the first period of a man's life the greatest danger is not to take the risk.

In professional work - certainly in the arts and graphics - 99% of people have zero courage. They blow with the wind.

What's frustrating to me is when, on a low-budget movie, people don't take chances. A big-budget movie, that script's your bible; nobody's going to risk going off the page. But when you're doing a very low-budget film, why not take some chances, intellectually, artistically?

While I hope that people like my work, I don't think an artist should be afraid of ­people not liking his work.

You don't get to celebrate yourself unless you risk being mocked or rejected. As an artist, you cannot play it safe. You just can't.

When it comes to storytelling, not taking risks is riskier than swinging for the fences. I have very simple ambitions when it comes to taking risks in storytelling and programming. I try very hard to avoid the expected.

Unwillingness to risk failure is always there, but it gets harder when you feel you have more to lose.

I've never played it safe on my own music.

In retrospect, I'm really shocked at how far I put my heart out there on the line with 'Prima Donna'. I seem to have this knack for being able to accomplish that.

Half the things that people do not succeed in are through fear of making the attempt.

You have to be willing to be afraid if you're going to be an artist.

As an actress I feel that if you start to impose your own inhibitions, then you are not doing your job.

I know what my comfort zones are. But without a back-up, I will never step out of my comfort zone. I don't go bungee jumping; I won't jump from the third floor without a safety net. I don't do such things. That's not my personality type.

Somewhere after you have few successful films, there is a fear of losing what you have got. It is very easy in the beginning, as you are a risk taker, have nothing to lose, and there is no perception about you.

It's difficult because we tend to overrate the pain of failure. We fear it too much. That's research that emerges from psychology. We think it's going to be worse than it really is. And, I think, as we get a bit older, really after we leave school or college, we quickly stop experimenting.

If you don't tolerate any risk, you can never innovate.

I think there's quite a lot of cowardice in music. I don't mind if it goes wrong, I just want to go for it.

Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt.

The man who knows it can't be done counts the risk, not the reward.

Eighty percent of all choices are based on fear. Most people don't choose what they want; they choose what they think is safe.

Writing songs is not something I wanted to share with people for a long time. It was precious to me. I didn't want someone to crush it. I waited until I felt strong enough to take the criticism.

Fain would I climb, yet fear I to fall.

Successful people have a bigger fear of failure than people who've never done anything because if you haven't been successful, then you don't know how it feels to lose it all. You don't have that fear. So why do you think people get stuck in those boxes? It's that fear of going back down.