John Lancaster Spalding Quotes

I'm aware of my audience in a way, and I do try to engage with them while I'm trying to go about my business of thinking. I believe they help me by providing a focus.

When I have an idea, it goes from vague, cloudy notion to 100,000 words in a heartbeat.

Some people compose their thoughts in front of a typewriter but I find that I am better at composing my thoughts in front of an audience.

I can clear my mind, and lyrics just come out; it's very easy for me.

I have to sit alone in a room and be alone with my own thoughts. It always starts with an idea, and once the idea grows, I have a concept of what I want to say, and once I go out there and start feeling the energy, that concept grows and becomes whatever it is.

I have a huge note on my phone where things just start popping up. It doesn't make that much sense to me at the time, but once a song is finished, I can read into it and figure out who the characters are in my life.

Left to it's own devices, writing is like weather. It has a drama, a form, a force to it that shapes the day. Just as good rain clears the air, a good writing day clears the psyche. There is something very right about simply letting yourself write. And the way to do that is to begin, to begin where you are.

For me, the beauty of the blank page, or empty screen,staring up at nine thirty after two cups of coffee and a deep breath remains unique. The blankness invites scribbling on, mental drawing , and the best feeling I know - apart from the more obvious sensual ones - is the feeling of putting down the first thought and seeing it turn into symbols. Making an idea into an emotion.

If an idea seems to find its way towards a stage setting, that's the direction I take. I don't know if I'm trying to achieve anything other than to follow an idea on to the page.

If I come across an issue, or something I feel strongly about, and I happen to think of a song that would go in that direction, then I do it. But that's not what I start out, necessarily, to do. Sometimes I may have an idea for a song - "Well, I'm going to write about a thing.

The magic happens in the creative studios. But sometimes you're inspired when you're removed from it a little bit. That's when the juice starts to percolate.

I think every writer's had the experience of having a really good idea, waiting to write it, and then once you write it, you're like, "Oh I kind of got past the sell by date on this." I'm not connected to the initial spark that was the idea. A lot of that's about staying open.

Collecting the dots. Then connecting them. And then sharing the connections with those around you. This is how a creative human works. Collecting, connecting, sharing.

I start by mulling a question and before I know it, a whole drama is unfolding in my head. Often, an idea sticks before I know what I'm going to do with it.

The observation of nature is part of an artist's life, it enlarges his form [and] knowledge, keeps him fresh and from working only by formula, and feeds inspiration.

The idea comes to me from outside of me - and is like a gift. I then take the idea and make it my own - that is where the skill lies.

The notion of sitting down and conjuring up, not only words in which to clothe thoughts but thoughts worthy of being clothed--the whole thing was absurdly beyond his desires.

I have always kept notebooks and I go back to them over and over. They are my compost pile of ideas.

Writin songs is like a mystery. The most difficult thing to do is have a good idea. If you have a decent idea, the songs are the easy part. Actually having something to say is the hard part. If you get an idea for a song, then it pulls you along. There are just some ideas that you get that are really hard to edit out; it's hard to stop thinking about some bad ideas. So you just finish it and you end up putting it on a record.

What judgment I had increases rather than diminishes; and thoughts, such as they are, come crowding in so fast upon me, that my only difficulty is to choose or reject; to run them into verse or to give them the other harmony of prose.

I like to think that every movie emerges from the conversations.

I think it's important to just be in your subconscious mind - at least when you're starting an idea.

Nothing in the whole world felt as good as being able to make something from a sudden idea.

Composing is a slowed-down improvisation; often one cannot write fast enough to keep up with the stream of ideas.

All the best ideas come out of the process; they come out of the work itself.