Jake Gyllenhaal Quotes

Questions don't easily die within me until they're answered, and so being able to write a song and put words to complex feelings is part of my process of understanding and letting go of things.

I started to use music almost like a therapist, where it's like, everything that I don't really dare to say or speak about, I can sing about.

If I do a bit on stage, I prepare too much. Those bits are all really, really carefully written, and overwritten, and researched. I really don't feel like I can wing it. So I write it out word for word, and when I'm onstage I'll improvise around it.

I'm generally quite an angry person, and I like to channel my anger toward something creative.

So much of performing is a mind game. You're memorizing thousands of notes, and if you start thinking about it in the wrong way, everything can blow up in your face.

Every audition is different, but I get incredibly nervous and insecure and worked up for however long I have to prep - that's when I get to spin. But you're not allowed to spin once you enter the room. Doubt really can't enter the room when you're auditioning - unless it's part of the character.

As a teenager, in my songbook, I used to script what my lighting would be like. I used to dance in my roo;, it was like putting myself in a trance, and making myself feel good about things, almost like a private ceremony of begging people to like you.

What you learn in any acting class is how to make a fool of yourself and enjoy things and get out of your head.

Writing for me is definitely a form of ventilation - a way for me to cope and deal with emotions. I think it is for any writer.

I certainly was performing before my writing was published, because I was performing when I was very young. And the thing is I'm very comfortable on stage, so a large portion of my act did come from ad-libs.

People expect you to play your best, so I go through a routine to prepare myself so that I know I'm physically and mentally ready - prepared for the game.

I don't think I'm sharp enough to not prepare and come on set and kill it.

On stage, you can use your emotions. It's the place where you can channel them. They have a purpose.

I think there's a, you know, certain kind of freedom for me when I get on stage. Maybe it's because I've held it back for so long that it's made me a little bit of angst inside. It's kind of like this energy needs to come out. And there's a certain sense, you know, of freedom when I get on that stage.

I get angry about stuff, I get very emotionally intense about stuff and that's how I get it out - with books, with the band, on my own onstage, but it's always kind of a wail.

I save the rage for the stage.

I've got the sort of personality that requires me to find some sort of release, and for me, it's performing.

I warm up at home. I hit the stage, I'm ready, whether it's rehearsal or anything.

I have to be composed; I have to be poised. I have to remember what my first piano teacher told me: 'You do not touch that piano until you are ready and until they are ready to listen to you.

There's variables at every single gig. I look forward to those every night. We have a lot of things that happen in our show, a lot of people from the outside watching the show might think it's one schtick after the next. We promised ourselves we have to be there mentally. We have to be aware. We are forced to be aware.

I think preparing every week like it's the most important game in the world makes things a little easier once you get in situations where a lot more people are watching and it might be a lot more important for people outside of the building.

I don't prepare for a live show.

I have to be mentally right every time I take the floor.

I express myself through song when I can't let people in on my thoughts otherwise. I need the creative process.

In the past, I tried to put on a brave face and smile after a defeat, but then it would backfire in training, and I'd get frustrated. Now I just embrace it, let it out, and then, two days later, I'm back in training and ready for the next game.