Natalie Goldberg Quotes

When I paint, some things come out, and I don't know. Maybe it's because I have such talent as a painter.

I really wish I knew what I was doing because I'd be writing hit songs every minute.

Any art worth its name requires you to be fundamentally lost for a very long time.

I'm always trying. Between every book, I think, 'Well now, it's time to get down to the serious stuff.'

Pressure has always been more of a friend than a foe for me with songwriting.

I write good songs out of fear... fear of failure. Because if they're not good enough, you feel yourself starting to fall.

Everybody doubts themselves. Every writer doubts themselves, every artist doubts himself, and every football player does.

Writing is something that you don't know how to do. You sit down and it's something that happens, or it may not happen. So, how can you teach anybody how to write? It's beyond me, because you yourself don't even know if you're going to be able to. I'm always worried, well, you know, every time I go upstairs with my wine bottle. Sometimes I'll sit at that typewriter for fifteen minutes, you know. I don't go up there to write. The typewriter's up there. If it doesn't start moving, I say, well this could be the night that I hit the dust.

A GREAT PAINTER will know a great deal about how he did it, but still he will say, “How did I do it?

There were moments of despondency when Shakespeare thought himself no poet, and Raphael no painter; when the greatest wits have doubted the excellence of their happiest efforts.

I'm not into, Hey, what's your sign? or any of that. But I don't know how I got here, and I don't know how I write songs. I don't know why I breathe.

Every single time I step into the studio, I say, 'Can I still do this? Do I still have it? Have I ever had it?' I suppose there's a good amount of self-loathing that goes into any form of artisanship.

To create something new is both thrilling and excruciating at the same time. It's great to have all these choices in front of you, and to have the writers in the room so you know exactly what they meant. But the downside is you want so badly not to screw it up!

I've never had a writer's block, but still I think: 'Is it going to happen this time?' You never know what you're going to get; you just put your fingers on the keys and hope.

There's probably a lot of people wondering if I can play.

I've always been insecure about my singing. That's why I've focused so much on my songwriting.

Everybody faces a blank piece of paper, no matter what they've written or painted or composed before. I can't imagine approaching every single new project with-without doubt.

I like people that can strap on a guitar and don't sweat the fact that you have to come up with a song in an hour. I want to work with someone who won't feel like they have to play along with Jason Molina. I want them to just have the confidence.

I like to sit down every day and not know where the book is going. I have no idea where the book is going to go or how it's going to end as I'm writing it.

I had no idea what I was doing when I wrote 'Search.' There was no carefully designed work plan. There was no theory that I was out to prove.

I still don't know if I can write songs. I don't think anyone ever knows if they can write songs.

We actors are superstitious creatures. We do all the homework, and we put all of the components together, but there's always one key aspect that we're not in charge of, really, and that's magic. You are always on the lookout for where and how that magic is going to ignite.

If I were to have a dream job, it would probably be a poet. Then again, I don't think I'm a very good poet!

Some writers take to drink, others take to audiences.

I have reached the point where I know that as long as I sit down to write, the ideas will come. What they will be, I don't know.