You can't be aware of everything. You'd fall down the stairs if you were aware of every intricate thing involved in going down stairs. Alan Alda More Quotes by Alan Alda More Quotes From Alan Alda Be brave enough to live creatively. Alan Alda be-brave enough brave Our lives depend on good communication. Good communication helps personal relationships, it helps bosses and employees get along better. We rely on it. Alan Alda boss communication helping People who laugh together generally don't kill each other. Alan Alda positive-attitude positive-thinking people It's really clear to me that you can't hang onto something longer than its time. Ideas lose certain freshness, ideas have a shelf life, and sometimes they have to be replaced by other ideas. Alan Alda shelves sometimes ideas artists try to say things that can't be said. in a fragile net of words, gestures, or colors, we hope to capture a feeling; a taste; a painful longing. but the net is always too porous, and we are left with the sweet frustration of almost knowing, which is teasingly pleasurable. Alan Alda frustration artist sweet I'll carry on, carry over, carry forward, Cary Grant, cash and carry, carry me back to Old Virginia, I'll even 'hari-kari' if you show me how, but I will not carry a gun! Alan Alda virginia cash gun When people are laughing, they're generally not killing one another. Alan Alda laughter happiness peace Working on The West Wing was similar in many ways to my experience on M*A*S*H, because you had people willing to work late at night to get it just right. Alan Alda night people I found I wasn't asking good enough questions because I assumed I knew something. I would box them into a corner with a badly formed question, and they didn't know how to get out of it. Now, I let them take me through it step by step, and I listen. Alan Alda good-enough asking steps When I started out as an actor, I thought, Here's what I have to say; how shall I say it? I began to understand that what I do in the scene is not as important as what happens between me and the other person. And listening is what lets it happen. It's almost always the other person who causes you to say what you say next. You don't have to figure out how you'll say it. You have to listen so simply, so innocently, that the other person brings about a change in you that makes you say it and informs the way you say it. Alan Alda actors important listening Everybody's on their toes and focused on what we're about to do, and then there's this moment where you relax because you see that everybody is there to do the best that they can. Everyone opens up to one another right away. That's a terrific thing. I love that about actors. They know how personal this job is. Alan Alda relax actors jobs I've been lucky enough to live through all the things that are supposed to give meaning to our lives, like parenting, grandparenting, art, celebrity. All these things you expect meaning to come from, and sometimes it comes when you're not expecting it. Alan Alda grandparent giving art I'm an angry person, angrier than most people would imagine, I get flashes of anger. What works for me is working out when it's useful to use that anger. Alan Alda work-out anger people Listening is being able to be changed by the other person. Alan Alda able listening inspirational As an artist, as an actor, as a writer, you have to use what's personal to you. You have to be personal about your work; otherwise, it doesn't ring true. Alan Alda actors artist use life is meaningless unless you bring meaning to it; ... it is up to us to create our own existence. Unless you do something, unless you make something it's as though you aren't there. Alan Alda meaningless existence life-is Almost everybody that's well-known gets tagged with a nickname. Alan Alda well-known nicknames wells Real listening is a willingness to let the other person change you. Alan Alda real change inspirational I found I wasn't asking good enough questions because I assumed I knew something. Alan Alda good-enough enough asking It makes it fun. When an actor plays a character, you want what that character wants. Otherwise it doesn't look authentic. So I really want to defeat Jimmy - I mean Jimmy as the character. Alan Alda fun character mean
