I love telling stories. I think of myself as a storyteller, and I don't feel bound by being just a singer or an actress. First, I'm a storyteller, and history is stories - the most compelling stories. There is a lot you can find out about yourself through knowing about history. I have always been attracted to things that are old. I have just always found such things interesting and compelling.

Zooey Deschanel

Categorized in : Thinking Interesting Knowing

Always the aim for me is making people feel like they are not alone. That's just the greatest feeling.

Zooey Deschanel

aim feelings people

A lot of people work out to be skinny. That's so boring, and it seems like a depressing goal for a modern woman.

Zooey Deschanel

depressing work-out people

Everyone has the heartbreak that shapes them in a way that they could never go back to the innocence that they had before.

Zooey Deschanel

shapes heart life

It's really fun to say no sometimes. I just don't want to discount how fun it is to say no and exercise your right to say no, and - as a girl - it's important to know how to say no... and that no means no!

Zooey Deschanel

girl fun mean

Nothing is more powerful than allowing yourself to truly be affected by things. Whether it’s a song, a stranger, a mountain, a tea kettle, an article, a sentence, a footstep -feel it all. Look around you. All of this is for you. Take it and have gratitude. Give it and feel love.

Zooey Deschanel

gratitude powerful song

I remember having this friend in school who said she didn't like the Beach Boys. And in that moment I knew we couldn't be friends anymore.

Zooey Deschanel

boys beach school

Don't allow the coldness and fear of others to tarnish your perfectly vulnerable beating heart.

Zooey Deschanel

coldness vulnerable heart

I feel like making music because - and this has much to do with the way I was able to make this record - there's more of myself in it.

Zooey Deschanel

records able way

It's never too late for a coffee. After all it's morning somewhere in the world.

Zooey Deschanel

coffee too-late morning

What led me to be an actor is that I have a strange something in me that can drastically change the way I appear to the world. Growing up, I couldn't understand why people would always have different ideas of me - but because of that I became aware of how you can manipulate your own ability to change. And then I learned to make a career of it.

Zooey Deschanel

growing-up careers ideas

I’m just being myself. There is not an ounce of me that believes any of that crap that they say. We can’t be feminine and be feminists and be successful? I want to be a f-king feminist and wear a f-king Peter Pan collar. So f-king what?

Zooey Deschanel

successful kings believe

I've been watching a lot of Joni Mitchell YouTube clips and I can't believe her transformation from this folk singer in Canada.

Zooey Deschanel

canada singers believe

I'm not doing it to pander to people. I just always knew what I liked versus what I don't like. I never liked things with too many zippers or spikes and stuff. That weirds me out. I like things that are pretty. And I think it's great to be pretty. I like being feminine. I think it's good to be feminine. We don't need to look like men or dress like men or talk like men to be powerful. We can be powerful in our own way, our own feminine way.

Zooey Deschanel

powerful men thinking

Girls get competitive, as though there's only one spot in the world for everything _ but that's not true. We need to stick together and see there's more to life than pleasing men. It's important not to cut yourself off from female friendships. I think sometimes girls get scared of other girls, but you need each other.

Zooey Deschanel

cutting girl men

That is so personal, and it’s my pet peeve when people press you on it. And it’s always women who get asked! Is anybody saying that to George Clooney?

Zooey Deschanel

presses pet people

I'm not playing a comedy. I want to be playing the truth of the moment, and then have the comedy come out.

Zooey Deschanel

comedy moments want

In an ideal world no one would talk before 10am. People would just hug, because waking up is really hard.

Zooey Deschanel

hug wake-up people

I accidentally entered a youth pageant when I was 14. That's like a beauty pageant, but without the beauty. It was terrible.

Zooey Deschanel

pageant women youth

I love singing Christmas carols. I know every harmony to every music-hall Christmas song.

Zooey Deschanel

singing christmas song

I'm not cynical about love at all. I'm very practical. I think love takes up a lot of time.

Zooey Deschanel

practicals cynical thinking