When I tried to grasp at either what I love or what I hate, I destroyed the very ability of being able to really penetrate the essence of either. By trying to understand it, I would just crush it. Jeff Mangum More Quotes by Jeff Mangum More Quotes From Jeff Mangum The world is this incredibly blurry, crazy dream that I'm just sort of stumbling through. Jeff Mangum crazy dream world And one day we will die and our ashes will fly from the aeroplane over the sea. But for now we are young; let us lay in the sun and count every beautiful thing we can see. Jeff Mangum sea beautiful life How strange it is to be anything at all. Jeff Mangum strange I think that so much of the creative process is a fragmentary one, and then it's about just allowing your intuition to put it together for you. It's funny how you create something and you think you're going in a million different directions, and then the thing you end up with is the thing that you wanted to create your whole life, but you're just as surprised by it as anybody else. Jeff Mangum intuition creative thinking Usually, I create tunes that are fragmented. I think the biggest obstacle for people with their creativity is that they feel they have to sit down and create this finished, polished product. Jeff Mangum creativity people thinking I would go to bed every night and have dreams about having a time machine and somehow I'd have the ability to move through time and space freely, and save Anne Frank. Jeff Mangum dream night moving I love the idea of a record containing an entire universe; where the sounds span decades of recording from all over the world and all sorts of different sources. Jeff Mangum different sound ideas Often, everywhere we look, we seem to find obstacles and facades and smokescreens, so it was really nice to find things in the world that actually spoke to me. And I felt like Eastern thought really spoke to me. Because it isn't trying to cover up the pain in life; it's trying to deal with it and overcome it in an intelligent way. I think the reason I love Eastern thought so much, and mysticism in general - but especially Buddhism - is because it seems to me an attempt to look life squarely in the face, as it is. Jeff Mangum buddhism pain nice God is a place you will wait for the rest of your life. Jeff Mangum rest-of-your-life waiting Soft silly music is meaningful, magical. Jeff Mangum music-is silly meaningful I decided at 10 I wanted to be in a band; everyone else wanted to play football. Jeff Mangum band play football Even our concepts about romantic love, I think, are destructive; treating people as property is destructive; being jealous of other people is destructive. You know, being jealous is a perfectly natural thing to feel, so it's not about suppressing jealousy, but learning to come to terms with it and to recognize its destructiveness and then to transform it. Jeff Mangum jealous romantic-love thinking My songs pretty much revolve in my brain most of the time - usually, whatevers coming next. Jeff Mangum next brain song I went to Louisiana Tech, which is just down the road from where we lived. It was an easy college to get into. Jeff Mangum louisiana college easy I bring a record home, and it connects with me like nothing else. In my ideal situation, somebody will do that with my record. Jeff Mangum records situation home I'm trying to find peace in the world, as it is. I'm feeling this sort of slow stripping of my mind, like the layers of an onion. I'm starting to see through all these little structures that have been imposed on me by my society that tell me how I'm supposed to view my life and the world. What I'm supposed to find to be important and what is not. Sometimes you see through so much of it that you feel like you're just a leaf blowing on the wind. Jeff Mangum important mind feelings We can see an anthill or a roach or a flower or anything, but we have this frame where our mind recognizes an anthill and then moves on, without taking the opportunity to have the sense of awe that we could have if we really looked at it. The montage is about taking pieces of reality and rearranging them - creating new frames to make you have to stop and look at things in a fresh way. It's basically taking pieces of everyday reality and rearranging them to show people the magic that is inherent in all of these things already. Jeff Mangum flower opportunity moving I think the songs I was writing after Aeroplane were full of a lot of undealt-with pain that was just a little too big... the issues seemed too large for me to confront intuitively through songwriting. I kept pushing it and pushing it. There are so many issues about being human and why people inflict pain on each other. There were seeds of all these things I hadn't dealt with. With just the personal issues, I felt I was in over my head, but then to write about it... To write you have to have at least a little bit of confidence you know what you're talking about. Jeff Mangum pain writing song I do feel like it's so important not to take that for granted - that opportunity to share your ideas with intelligent, beautiful people. Jeff Mangum intelligent opportunity beautiful You know, you struggle and cry and moan and thrash around and beat your head against the wall... and then you realize that you're just yourself, and you come to terms with yourself struggling. There are some serious, serious things to deal with in terms of the immensity of the suffering that we humans create for ourselves and for the world around us. Jeff Mangum wall suffering struggle
