Shirley MacLaine Quotes

Emotional sounds don't lie.

So is darkness better than a heartfelt lie?

What encouragement the apostle holds out to us. O my friends, that we might leave all our pretensions, and come to the truth in our own hearts.

I was looking for what was coming from a man's soul and a man's conviction. I didn't care about his past. If it was innate and natural and felt good to him and it communicated.

I've found that in now having experienced what it's like to make records and just through growing up in general that you should be expressive about what's affecting you instead of trying to sing about a subject just for the sake of other people getting something from it.

I never smile unless I mean it.

And if I have a strong point, it's that I like to believe it's not cheap or schmaltzy sentimentality.

When you're playing country music, you have to tell the truth.

Let your tongue speak what your heart thinks.

Very seldom do we receive any support for trusting ourselves, listening to our own sense of inner truth, and expressing ourselves in a direct and honest way.

I don't think you get to good writing unless you expose yourself and your feelings. Deep songs don't come from the surface; they come from the deep down. The poetry and the songs that you are suppose to write, I believe are in your heart.

People assume actors are born liars, but I'd argue the actor's job is to tell the truth. And I've realised I'm not a good liar.

Anything I sing is supposed to be genuine. It's not supposed to be make-believe or I'm making something for the crowd to jump or to hold up their hands.

I can't fake emotion.

Anything that I ever do is from the heart and authentic.

The tongue should express what is in the heart.

I've always sought to get after something that's foundational in people. That comes through my faith, through my belief in life, through trying to hit something that's true every time. I think that's really where you move people, when you touch on something that's true, that's not based on fluff or based on a moment or a movement.

Country music listeners really like genuineness, and I hope that's what we portray, and I think that's what we do.

If it's not coming from your heart and if you don't believe it, then more than likely you're not going to be able to bring yourself to performances that justify playing.

It's hard for me to fake smile. I personally think I look stupid fake smiling.

Self-expression is my goal, I want to be real with my feelings. Singing and dancing and all the joy that goes with performing come from my heart. If I can't feel it, I won't do it.

We wanted to make something that sounded perfect because of the quality of the emotion...the honesty.

Always make your work be personal. And, you never have to lie... There is something we know that's connected with beauty and truth. There is something ancient. We know that art is about beauty, and therefore it has to be about truth.

When you write you in a way write out of what you think of as your best self, the part of you that is lacking in foibles and weaknesses and egotism and vanities and so on. You're just trying to really say something as truthful as you can out of the best that you have in you.

Movement never lies. It is a barometer telling the state of the soul's weather to all who can read it.