Quotes & Sayings About Having Ideas

I keep on having ideas and developments. Some happen and some don't, but I still always have a way of telling a story. — John Waters

Meanwhile, feminists regularly insist that the absence of a uterus and a vagina excludes men from having an opinion about things like abortion. So a man can't have ideas about women's issues because he lacks the correct anatomy, but he can actually be a woman despite lacking the correct anatomy? How does that make any kind of sense? — Matt Walsh

The publishing industry stopped having new ideas out of respect for the untimely death of Ernest Hemingway in 1961 and has been doing everything the same way ever since. — Adam Mansbach

I can only think of so many good ideas in a week. Having other people contribute makes my life easier. — Martin Fowler

Now, ideas are the raw material of progress. Everything first takes shape in the form of an idea. But an idea itself is worth nothing. An idea, like a machine, must have power applied to it before it can accomplish anything. The men who have won fame and fortune through having an idea are those who devoted every ounce of their strength and every dollar they could muster to putting it into operation. Ford had a big idea, but he had to sweat and suffer and sacrifice to make it work. — B.C. Forbes

Vaclav Havel was the most amazing man in terms of being the combination of somebody with massive moral authority, great courage for having espoused the concepts of democracy, freedom throughout a very difficult communist period, a very modest man, and somebody with a fabulous sense of humor and the idea of being able to see the absurd in situations. — Judy Woodruff

It's really easy to not be satisfied with your work, or people, or anything, but I really embrace the idea of not having to want [anything]. Not because you're denying yourself anything, but because it [everything] is already there. — Thao Nguyen

I'm sitting at the bar, rearranging the order of my jokes. I'm under the delusion that I'm having bad shows because of some cosmic misalignment of words, phrases, and ideas. I may as well have cast runes into a spirit bowl, hoping that the collective heart of the audience would open to my necromantic call. Maybe that's how jugglers do it. Those guys never have shitty sets. — Patton Oswalt

The true Vedantic spirit does not start out with a system of preconceived ideas. It possesses absolute liberty and unrivalled courage among religions with regard to the facts to be observed and the diverse hypotheses it has laid down for their coordination. Never having been hampered by a priestly order, each man has been entirely free to search wherever he pleased for the spiritual explanation of the spectacle of the universe. — Romain Rolland

It's not because of the amount of money. For me and my colleagues, the most important thing is that we create an open information flow for people. Having media corporations owned by conglomerates is just not an attractive idea to me. — Mark Zuckerberg

In a June 25, 2010, Washington Post article, the CIA acknowledged officially
discussing the creation of a video of a fake Saddam Hussein having sex with a
teenage boy in order to discredit him in the eyes of the Iraqi people. Evidently,
the Agency did create a video of a fake Osama Bin Laden drinking liquor
around a campfire with his cronies, bragging about their conquests of young
boys. The article quoted an anonymous former CIA officer "chuckling" at the
memory, and declaring that the actors used in the video were drawn from
"some of us darker-skinned employees." These ridiculous clandestine ideas
brought to mind the childish efforts to assassinate Fidel Castro forty years
earlier. — Donald Jeffries

I loved planning 'The Tyra Show' more than actually having to do it. I loved coming up with show ideas, honing each program and crafting it. I'm more excited being in a meeting than being on TV. — Tyra Banks

The truly scientific mind is altogether unafraid of the new, and while having no mercy for ideas which have served their turn or shown their uselessness, it will not grudge to any unfamiliar conception its moment of full and friendly attention, hoping to expand rather than to minimize what small core of usefulness it may happen to contain. — Wilfred Trotter

It wasn't that expectations changed. But [teens] went from general expectations of success to having no idea of the right thing to do. In the '60s there was a strong prejudice against careerism. We were self-indulgent and self-destructive. — Michael Medved

Self-evaluation and self-criticism are, basically, neurotic tendencies which derive from our not having enough confidence in ourselves, confidence in the sense of seeing what we are, knowing what we are, knowing that we can afford to open. We can afford to surrender that raw and rugged neurotic quality of self and step out of fascination, step out of preconceived ideas. — Chogyam Trungpa

Your Brain is for having ideas not storing them. — David Allen

Truth consists of having the same idea about something that God has. — Joseph Joubert

I know well that many of my readers do not think as I do. This also is most natural and confirms the theorem. For although my opinion turn out erroneous, there will always remain the fact that many of those dissentient readers have never given five minutes' thought to this complex matter. How are they going to think as I do? But by believing that they have a right to an opinion on the matter without previous effort to work one out for themselves, they prove patently that they belong to that absurd type of human being which I have called the "rebel mass." It is precisely what I mean by having one's soul obliterated, hermetically closed. Here it would be the special case of intellectual hermetism. The individual finds himself already with a stock of ideas. He decides to content himself with them and to consider himself intellectually complete. — Ortega Y Gasset

The next best thing to having good ideas is recognizing good ideas from your users. Sometimes the latter is better. — Eric S. Raymond

I don't wear glasses, so I like the idea of not having to put them on to watch a movie. It's a hard barrier to get beyond. — Joseph Kosinski

Being an artist and having a following can be a very scary thing because idolization makes you question your inner role in the universe. A lot of people get caught up in this idea of, "Wow! This world does revolve around me," and it most certainly does not. It's the exact opposite; these people don't exist for you, you exist for them. — Halsey

Having the ability to be brutally honest with yourself is the greatest challenge you face when creating a business model. Too often we oversell ourselves on the quality of the idea, service, or product. We don't provide an honest assessment of how we fit in the market, why customers will buy from us, and at what price. — Mark Cuban

You can write about other people and their ideas and life without having lived it, but even your perception of that is going to be colored by what you know and what you experience. And this is undeniable. — James Salter

All humans are part male and part female. The other side must be explored to gain complete understanding ofourselves and the world we live in. Forme, the idea of having a feminine perspective is a willingness to be vulnerable. — Billy Corgan

It sounds cheesy, but if you are having fun, people will love your company, you will be more successful, and more ideas will come your way. — Nick Woodman

The whole idea of mindfulness is all about having a second-level monitoring of your thoughts and being able to recognize them as being negative or harmful before they become a part of your being, before they become some kind of action like writing an angry letter to someone or speaking too strongly to someone. — Pankaj Mishra

When I direct my own scripts, it's much easier as it's been in my head for a year already. What I love about this is having an idea and seeing it come to fruition onscreen. I would like to direct someone else's script one day, but I might not get round to it before I die - you can't legislate for being hit by a bus! — Ricky Gervais

One entered the world, Denis pursued, having ready-made ideas about everything. One had a philosophy and tried to make life fit into it. One should have lived first and then made one's philosophy to fit life ... Life, facts, things were horribly complicated; ideas, even the most difficult of them, deceptively simple. In the world of ideas, everything was clear; in life all was obscure, embroiled. Was it surprising that one was miserable, horribly unhappy? — Aldous Huxley

Even when I'm not directing, that doesn't stop Owen from having ideas for what I should be doing. — Ben Stiller

Having the world's best idea will do you no good unless you act on it. People who want milk shouldn't sit on a stool in the middle of a field in hopes that a cow will back up to them. — Curtis Grant

Of course, you don't have to have a degree to be rich. You just have to have ideas. Maybe having a degree sets you back, for it stuffs you into tick-tock [the daily grind of work], and perhaps that stifles your creative mind. But the fact is that many millionaires have few educational qualifications of any kind at all. However, they still have knowledge. The difference is, they have knowledge they can sell, and others have the "common knowledge" of tick-tock, which isn't worth as much, if anything at all. — Stuart Wilde

Having too many ideas is not always a good thing. — Paul Arden

News is often dispersed as thoughtlessly and effectively as that pollen which the bees carry off (having no idea how powdery they are) when they are buzzing in search of their particular nectar. — George Eliot

And, Bruce and I are pretty close as well. We're both from Texas and we both understand each other. When I'm having trouble with a scene, I'll just go over to him and be like, "I have no idea what's happening here. What are we doing?" He's just been such a wonderful sounding board and, obviously, he's a tremendously talented actor. — Angie Harmon

Why are corporations so fleeting? ... Instead of imitating the freewheeling city, these businesses minimize the very interactions that lead to new ideas. They erect walls and establish hierarchies. They keep people from relaxing and having insights. They stifle conversations, discourage dissent, and suffocate social networks. Rather than maximizing employee creativity they become obsessed with minor efficiencies. — Jonah Lehrer

If there is anything more dangerous to the life of the mind than having no independent commitment to ideas, it is having an excess of commitment to some special and constricting idea. — Richard Hofstadter

The anarch is oriented to facts, not ideas. He fights alone, as a free man, and would never dream of sacrificing himself to having one inadequacy supplant another and a new regime triumph over the old one. In this sense, he is closer to the philistine; the baker whose chief concern is to bake good bread; the peasant, who works his plow while armies march across his fields. — Ernst Junger

The beauty of having a studio is I can go in and record any time I want to, so you can always put down your ideas or whatever. You use your voice recorder and, you know, take your voice notes down and just preserve all the little jewels and gems when you're in there, putting that song together. — Big Boi

Being human and investigating the affairs of the gods is an extreme version of being tone-deaf and talking about music, or having never served in the army and talking about warfare: we resemble amateurs trying to use arguments from probability based on opinions and conjecture to unearth the ideas of experts. Given — Plutarch

People win elections based on having the right ideas, the right plans, like my seven step plan for 700,000 jobs. That's what wins elections. — Rick Scott

You can't have a university without having free speech, even though at times it makes us terribly uncomfortable. If students are not going to hear controversial ideas on college campuses, they're not going to hear them in America. I believe it's part of their education. — Donna Shalala

Think beyond the pain. Think beyond the difficulty. Commit to having one good idea every day. What new idea will you claim today? — Mary Morrissey

After you have loss in your life and after you experience something like losing your parents, the greatest gift of that was it prepared me for [anything]. Nothing else is as scary, and certainly stand-up comedy is not as scary as sitting there with your mom and having to have last conversations and things like that. It's heavy stuff, but it's enlightening because it makes me think I shouldn't be afraid of sharing ideas and thoughts with people. It's the yin and the yang of life. — Dane Cook

Creativity is the process of having original ideas that have value. It is a process; it's not random. — Ken Robinson

I've had only one idea in my life - a true idee fixe. To put it as bluntly as possible - the idea of having my own way. 'Control!' expresses it. The control of human behavior. In my early experimental days it was a frenzied, selfish desire to dominate. I remember the rage I used to feel when a prediction went awry. I could have shouted at the subjects of my experiments, 'Behave, damn you! Behave as you ought! — B.F. Skinner

Having a great idea for a product is important, but having a great idea for product distribution is even more important. — Reid Hoffman

A champion is suppose to hate to lose, and it wasn't like I was ever crazy about the idea. But I learned to deal with losing without having my spirit or confidence broken, which would help immensely over time, not just in the big picture but even in specific matches when I found myself in a jam. Fear of losing is a terrible thing. — Pete Sampras

The idea that a student can write a sonnet or a novel without having a sound understanding about its history, and where it fits into literature as a whole, seems to me to be manifestly daft. — Nicholas Royle

I've heard people say that God is the gift of desperation, and there's a lot to be said for having really reached a bottom where you've run out of any more good ideas or plans for everybody else's behavior; or how to save and fix and rescue; or just get out of a huge mess, possibly of your own creation. — Anne Lamott

Having an open mind is the most important precondition for creating
new ideas. — Eraldo Banovac

Speaking of metaphor, the dative construction works with a number of verbs of communication, as in Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies and Sing me no song, read me no rhyme. It's as if we think of ideas as things, knowing as having, communicating as sending, and language as the package. This is sometimes called the conduit metaphor, and it can be seen in dozens of expressions for thinking, saying, and teaching. We gather our ideas to put them into words, and if our verbiage is not empty or hollow, we might get these ideas across to a listener, who can unpack our words to extract their content. — Steven Pinker

Writers live with fear. Some writers cannot deal with the fear, and so they quit or refuse to publish. In order to write, you must either ignore the fear or trick it into leaving you alone. The fear is very sly, though and hard to trick. The fear in writing comes from exposing your thoughts, your emotions, your experiences, your ideas, your talent, your intelligence and ultimately your self to public scrutiny and possible scorn. The fear is by no means groundless. You have opened yourself up to the possibility of public humiliations...I sometimes wonder if perhaps the greatest novel ever written isn't gathering dust in some filing cabinet somewhere, simply because its author could not overcome the fear of having it published. — Patrick F. McManus

Having lots of ideas doesn't mean you're clever, any more than having lots of soldiers means you're a good general. — Nicolas Chamfort

In actual modern Europe a freethinker does not mean a man who thinks for himself. It means a man who, having thought for himself, has come to one particular class of conclusions, the material origin of phenomena, the impossibility of miracles, the improbability of personal immortality and so on. And none of these ideas are particularly liberal. — G.K. Chesterton

Having colleagues nearby, whether at the beach or in a crypt, means the ideas are always flowing — Richard Branson

But a far more virulent strain survived. It's having sex with your thoughts. You'll give birth to increasingly more monstrous ideas. — Grant Morrison

People think innovation is just having a good idea but a lot of it is just moving quickly and trying a lot of things. — Mark Zuckerberg

Having a great idea is simply not enough. The eventual goal is vastly more important than any idea. It is how ideas are implemented that counts in the long run — Felix Dennis

For me, above all, my stances on global warming are a product of my love for the weather. There is no goal for me. It's about having another chance to do what I was made to do. And somehow, when I'm with people who I sense have the same ideas, it makes me stronger and more able to run toward what I was made for. — Joe Bastardi

Those who guide us, who inspire us, having gone our way before, are now partners with us in building a better world. Any success we have is theirs as well as ours. To copy or imitate them should be only the beginning-the apprentice stage of life. It is fine to think, "what will a Shaker do? What would Scott Nearing have said? What would Gandhi have thought?" These are good exercises for the mind, a way of weighing ideas and contemplated actions, valuable so long as we do not follow anyone blindly.
Only by standing on their shoulders can we build a better world, but we should use the wise as advisers, not masters. — William Coperthwaite

I have no idea of what it's going to look like when I start a piece. Making art is like having a relationship. You want to bring in some ideas, but if you don't allow it to develop naturally and speak to you as it develops, you end up imposing and projecting upon it. — Nick Bantock

It's great to meet people in a setting where it's really conducive to hanging out and having
fun. Most film festivals are really low-stress, and good times to hang out with buddies and talk about what you're working on and come up with new ideas. — Joe Swanberg

When I think about the idea of Rebel Wilson having to go to the Oscars and not having something amazing to wear that's made for her, it drives me mad. — Beth Ditto

I must have been about twenty-one or twenty-two at the time, and held then many rather wild ideas on the subject of women: conceptions largely the result of having read a good deal without simultaneous opportunity to modify by personal experience the recorded judgment of others upon that matter: estimates often excellent in their conclusions if correctly interpreted, though requiring practical knowledge to be appreciated at their full value. — Anthony Powell

When you completely extract yourself from anything familiar, you start reverting back to that state of mind where you're having conversations with yourself, and that's where the weirdest and most honest ideas come from. — Alan Palomo

I've got a lot of energy at my shows, I'm very performative; that gave me the idea, I want to try to translate that into a musical project, having the same energy I have onstage and on my album. — Lunice

Just for the record, I have come to fear all of your ideas in advance, simply from having endured enough of them. — Violet Haberdasher

Once again, only religion can answer the question of the purpose of life. One can hardly be wrong in concluding that the idea of life having a purpose stands and falls with the religious system. — Sigmund Freud

It's not that we need new ideas, but we need to stop having old ideas. — Edwin Land

A past President, bullied and sandbagged by a monkey posing as a newscaster, finally lashed back ... The nation's marketplace of ideas is being poisoned by a propaganda company so blatant that Tokyo Rose would've quit ... As with all the other nefariousness and slime of this, our worst presidency since James Buchanan, he [President Bush] is having it done for him, by proxy. Thus, the sandbag effort by Fox News Friday afternoon. — Keith Olbermann

But this is one of the things that makes rap at its best so human. It doesn't force you to pretend to be only one thing or another, to be a saint or a sinner. It recognizes that you can be true to yourself and still have unexpected dimensions and opposing ideas. Having a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other is the most common thing in the world. The real bullshit is when you act like you don't have contradictions inside you, that you're so dull and unimaginative that your mind never changes or wanders into strange, unexpected places. — Jay-Z

Each year, every city in the world that can should have a multiday festival. More people meeting each other, digging new types of music, new foods, new ideas. You want to stop having so many wars? This could be a step in the right direction. — Henry Rollins

The first skill to develop for sensing energy is the ability to pay attention. Learn how to observe others by being silent. You know what it is like to sit back and watch. Observe any area about which you want more information without judgment or having any opinions or preconceived ideas about it. As you think intently about something, you will begin to receive guidance, ideas, and new thoughts about the issue. — Sanaya Roman

Sophie found philosophy doubly exciting because she was able to follow all the ideas by using her own common sense - without having to remember everything she had learned at school. She decided that philosophy was not something you can learn; but perhaps you can learn to think philosophically. — Jostein Gaarder

I do think that I'm a big believer in having an idea or having ideas and just tucking them away in the back of your brain. Even if you aren't consciously thinking of them, I think they simmer. You're working on them, even if you don't know you're working on them, and I think having something in your head for a while is a valuable thing. — Rian Johnson

Having ideas is not the same thing as being creative. Creation is execution, not inspiration. — Kevin Ashton

One must recently have lived on or close to a college campus to have a vivid intimation of what has happened. It is there that we see how a number of energetic social innovators, plugging their grand designs, succeeded over the years in capturing the liberal intellectual imagination. And since ideas rule the world, the ideologues, having won over the intellectual class, simply walked in and started to run things. Run just about everything. There never was an age of conformity quite like this one, or a camaraderie quite like the Liberals'. — William F. Buckley Jr.

The conceit of literary intellectuals is to imagine that other people don't have ideas so that they can assume a superior status by having their own... — Nicholas Mosley

Academic credentials are neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for having your ideas taken seriously. If a famous professor repeatedly says stupid things, then tries to claim he never said them, there's no rule against calling him a mendacious idiot - and no special qualifications required to make that pronouncement other than doing your own homework.Conversely, if someone without formal credentials consistently makes trenchant, insightful observations, he or she has earned the right to be taken seriously, regardless of background. — Paul Krugman

The future may require not so much having a new idea as stopping having an old idea. — Edwin Land

Richness, the ideas of having plenty of money, is not ... an absolute state. Richness is about the amount of money you have compared to the people you see around you. It is about where you are in relation to others, and where they are in relation to you ... and whether you can have the things you want and other people have. — John Lanchester

I believe there is a relationship between having an interest in the arts and the behaviour of society as a whole. Some politicians find it difficult that the arts is a weapon of happiness ... Politics is often about deprivation rather than the opening up of ideas and nourishing creative endeavour. — Richard Eyre

That whole bit was something John had come up with, the man having a terrible habit of carrying out his drunken 3:00 A.M. ideas even after daylight and sobriety came. It was always 3:00 A.M. for John. — David Wong

Having the experience of senior guys around you just makes things easier as they all contribute ideas and set the standards for the group. — George Bailey

It's easy to live the expected and conventional. It's when you live the unexpected that you start having fun with your life. — Richard Bach

If you aren't having impractical ideas, and dreaming impossible dreams, then you aren't reaching far enough, high enough, or deep enough! — Dixie Gillaspie

I enjoyed so much working with the guys from Wilco, and riffing off of them, and having someone come up to me with ideas, because normally in the studio it's me who has to come up with all the ideas. — Billy Bragg

Jen came first, and then they wanted to cast somebody that would ... Kevin liked the idea of having a kind of The Ghost of That Character kind of haunt the movie in a way throughout, by having Raquel look so much like her. And also, it was sort of serendipity. I mean, she was also the best actress. I mean, as you can see Raquel has a pretty appealing, engaging kind of precocious, sparkly quality that's ... it was just luck really that she happened to the film. — Ben Affleck

Was it possible that a bustling display of energy might only be a camouflage for a spiritual vacuum? The thought so impressed me that I mentioned it next day to the French purser, at whose table I was sitting. He nodded his agreement. "Stevenson is right," he said. "Indeed, if you will pardon my saying so, the idea applies particularly to you Americans. A lot of your countrymen keep so busy getting things done that they reach the end of their lives without ever having lived at all." — Arthur Gordon Webster

Government is force, pure and simple. There's no way to sugar-coat that. And because government is force, it will attract the worst elements of society - people who want to use government to avoid having to earn their living and to avoid having to persuade others to accept their ideas voluntarily. — Harry Browne

All ideas having even the slightest redeeming social importance - unorthodox ideas, controversial ideas, even ideas hateful to the prevailing climate of opinion, have the full protection of the guarantees [of the First Amendment]. — William J. Brennan

We're trying, despite having done research and having obviously preconceived ideas, we try our best to be as open-hearted as possible, and try to create context. So that's always going to be the challenge, making a program like 'Gaycation', and we are always thinking about it, reflecting on it, and doing our best to show the whole picture as much as possible in a 45-minute span. Hopefully that comes across. — Ellen Page

I knew I wanted to work with Brad [Falchuk] and Ian [Brennan] again on something comedic, and we are having a blast writing SCREAM QUEENS. We hope to create a whole new genre - comedy-horror - and the idea is for every season to revolve around two female leads. — Ryan Murphy

One of the best things about having a blog is that you've got a place to run your craziest ideas up the flagpole and see just how quickly they get shot down. — Steven D. Levitt

I fought the idea of having security for a very long time, because I really value normalcy. I really do. I like to be able to take a drive by myself. — Taylor Swift

Developing excellent COMMUNICATION skills is absolutely essential to effective leadership. The leader must be able to share knowledge and ideas to transmit a sense of urgency and enthusiasm to others. If a leader can't get a message across clearly and motivate others to act on it, then having a message doesn't even matter. — Gil Amelio

It's the disease of thinking that a having a great idea is really 90% of the work. And if you just tell people, 'here's this great idea,' then of course they can go off and make it happen. The problem with that is that there's a tremendous amount of craftsmanship between a having a great idea and having a great product. — Steve Jobs

Good ideas rarely seem like good ideas at their inception, that's what stops the majority of people from having them — Drew Gummerson

Idea that all the beats are wildly liberal and progressive is ridiculous. You have people thinking for themselves and having certain affinities because of their upbringing and who their family are, their own people who were close to them who fought in these wars and so on. It's complicated. But they had that ability to continue the conversation. — Anne Waldman

Brutes abstract not.
If it may be doubted, whether beasts compound and enlarge their ideas, that way, to any degree; this, I think, I may be positive in, that the power of abstracting is not at all in them; and that the having of general ideas is that which puts a perfect distinction betwixt man and brutes, and is an excellency which the faculties of brutes do by no means attain to. — John Locke