Quotes About Persistence

When you're 20 and you're in acting school and your teachers tell you that 95 percent of actors are unemployed for twenty years, you think it doesn't apply to you. But it does take twenty years to become real, because that's what you have to do to be an interesting actor.

I was almost ready to call it quits - sick of doing a job and then being back on the unemployment line and trying to make ends meet. But I loved acting and didn't know what else to do.

Pretty much from 1979 through 1988, the backbone of my career was the theater. Working on Broadway a couple of times, working off-Broadway, and also doing a lot of regional theater. Make no mistake, I lived very frugally. I had an apartment that was real cheap. I would get two or three jobs per season, and in between I'd be on unemployment.

It's just as easy for me to be building a fence somewhere and scraping by on unemployment in between doing a guest star spot. I've been there.

I moved right to L.A., and I had a year of active unemployment. I had 50-something auditions for 50-something different projects, testing and doing callbacks, and could not get hired. And then, almost a year to the day of being out in L.A., I booked my first job, and then I started booking something every other month.

If it comes as a constant surprise each and every time something unexpected occurs, you're not only going to be miserable whenever you attempt something big, you're going to have a much harder time accepting it and moving on to attempts two, three, and four.

You can always imagine the unexpected and strive for it. You may never get there, but it's always a good thing to have.

There is the morass, wherein you plunge up to your knees, or the walking over the stubborn, dwarfish shrubbery, whereby one treads down the forests of Labrador; and the unexpected bunting or sylvia which perchance, and indeed as if by chance alone, you now and then see flying before you, or hear singing from the ground creeping plant.

After a series of failures, to be part of a project like 'Baahubali: The Beginning' is dream-like, and it's easily the most unexpected thing of my career.

Who can't relate to a story of a dreamer who, against all odds, is going to make something of himself that is completely unexpected?

You were in the midst of a chaotic, unfair, didn't-know-how-it-was-going-to-end story, and the only thing you could do was... keep moving.

It happens too frequently that after a couple of poor performances, athletes are dumped. That's unfair as Olympic glory is a long path.

You can make something out of every unfinished story and every rejection if you work at it.

You can't die with an unfinished book.

I won't leave any unfinished manuscripts.

Never leave a crossword unfinished.

I don't like to leave anything unfinished. I have an absolute need to see that every phone call is returned, every letter answered.

When I get on a roll with something, it's really hard for me to put it down unfinished.

I start a lot of things and purposely leave them unfinished. When I have a bunch of really long emails, and I need time to think about the response, I'll actually start replying, leave them as drafts, and move onto something else mid-sentence.

There are dozens of unfinished or aborted projects in my files, but I can only assume they don't get done because they're not robust enough to struggle through the birth process.

What I'm really looking to do is retire undefeated; I'm not sure when the right time to retire will be, but I know that I'm not done yet. Something still feels unfinished, and that's why I'm going to keep going.

My final fight was called 'Unfinished Business' - and I finished it.

Even if I never sold another book, I'd keep writing, because the stories are here, in my head. Stories that just need to be told. I love watching a plot unfold, and feeling the surprise when the unexpected happens.

I do not think there is any thrill that can go through the human heart like that felt by the inventor as he sees some creation of the brain unfolding to success... such emotions make a man forget food, sleep, friends, love, everything.