Quotes About Persistence

There are some species, one was the Goliath Tigerfish, that took me six years to track down and catch.

You try to make the most of each day. I'm not big into setting real specific goals. I think, really, if you just focus on every day - and I know that's the oldest cliche in the book, but it really is true. Day 1 of camp means just as much as Day 17 of camp. If you really try to focus on each and every one of those days, long-term.

I really, specifically, love acting, and I think it's a really cool thing to be really indulgent and follow that. I have a lot of ambitions in life, but for the next few years, I just want to be an actor. That's a lucky opportunity, and that drives me to want to be good at that.

I had - I was pretty hell bent on getting into the cartoon business specifically as an artist from the get-go.

The reality of show business - and I suppose a lot of businesses, but specifically show business - is that it is this business of 'no's.' It's mostly 'no's.'

As a book editor, you need to pitch every one of your books again and again, dozens of times, for months on end. From a quick conversation with your boss or a letter that'll be read by just one person, to a five-minute speech in front of 50 colleagues or cover copy that'll be in front of millions of eyes.

I tried four times to get into the Central School of Speech and Drama before I got accepted. I started when I was 17, which was too young, in retrospect, and finally went when I was 21. I just kept plugging away. Determined? Yeah, I think I was.

So many times, I have a speech ready but no dice. Always a bridesmaid, never a mother.

I did dancing and singing when I was little, and then when I was 12 years old my friends were taking speech and drama at school. They were private lessons, and I started doing that. Over the years everyone else dropped out and I just kept going. I loved it.

I've sat through boring speeches; didn't get up and leave.

I didn't have a lot of good film coming out of college. Also, my height didn't help me at all. I ran a decent 40, but no one would call it blazing speed.

Humans are built for endurance, not speed. We're awful sprinters compared to every other animal. We try to run our races as if they were speed races, but they are not. They're endurance races. Even a marathon, the way it's run now, it's not an endurance contest.

Me, personally, I'm going to be out there running full speed and chasing down running backs and chasing down quarterbacks. That's what I do best.

A lot of the people I know, they don't train like that. They do a lot of quick stuff, just speed drills. But I run long distance. I've always been like that, though, even when I was in high school. That's just how I train myself.

I only know one speed.

I have been writing since I was old enough to spell. I have never considered not writing.

I've always kept writing. There's never been a moment where I went through a spell where I just don't write.

It took me a while to learn how to spell my own name.

I've spent my entire life spelling my surname.

I didn't become a good writer until I learned how to rewrite. And I don't just mean fixing spelling and adding a comma. I rewrite each of my books five or six times, and each time I change huge portions of the story.

It's about being open to what comes your way. I came to New York and saw 'Spelling Bee.' I said to myself, 'That's the greatest show ever, and I can't believe I'm not a part of it.' I felt the only way I'm going to get to be a part of something that good is to live in New York. So I moved to New York and ended up in 'Spelling Bee.'

There are definitely times - and I think this is pretty common among cartoonists - where you spend an entire day trying to think of an idea, and you're like, 'I give up.' And then you go and take a shower or run an errand, and halfway there, you get an idea.

There are a lot of games out there these days that you either know how to play it or don't, or if you spend enough time pounding away at it, you're going to beat it eventually.

There have been many times when you spend a number of months and the finished product is not what you wanted to see. And 'Batman Begins' was what I wanted to see.