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I Don't Feel Like My Work Is Dependent On My Size. I Feel Like My Work Is Dependent On The Fact That I'm An Everywoman. I'd Be An Everywoman If I Lost 20 Pounds Or If I Gained 50 Pounds, Because Of My Attitude And It's My Relationship To The World And The Fact That Like I Have Two Front Teeth That Are Bigger Than The Rest Of My Teeth.

-Lena Dunham

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I Don't Feel Like

Lena Dunham

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I Don't Feel Like My Work Is Dependent On My Size. I Feel Like My Work Is Dependent On The Fact That I'm An Everywoman. I'd Be An Everywoman If I Lost 20 Pounds Or If I Gained 50 Pounds, Because Of My Attitude And It's My Relationship To The World And The Fact That Like I Have Two Front Teeth That Are Bigger Than The Rest Of My Teeth.

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I Just Don't Want To Be Around People Who Don't Hate Everything In Their Life Right Now.

I Deserved Kisses. I Deserved To Be Treated Like A Piece Of Meat But Also Respected For My Intellect.

It Is Really Funny How Even Cool Chicks Are Sort Of Like, 'our Moms Covered That Feminism Thing And Now We're Living In A Post-that World,' When That Just Isn't True.

I've Only Recently Realized That I Have A Radically Different Relationship With My Parents Than A Lot Of People.

You Can't Force Other People To Like You And You Just Kind Of Have To Ride The Wave. I Think I Could Have Saved Myself A Lot Of Sleepless Nights With That Advice.

I'm Really Lucky Because I Surround Myself Onset With People Who I Really Trust To Give Me Feedback, So I'm Directing Myself.

I'm So In Awe Of What Visual Artists Do And I Do Understand The Differences Of What Visual Artists Do. I Have A Small Art Collection I Hope To Expand.

My Uncle's A Lawyer And I Remember Going To See Him In Court And Thinking, 'that's Cool, Too Bad I Could Never Be A Lawyer.'

I Went To Schools That Were Small Enough That Basically Everyone Was In A Play. I Played A Bouncing Ball In A Production Of Alice In Wonderland And A Fat Man In An Italian Commedia Dell'arte Play. I Was Given Some Small Chances.

From What I Hear, [ "fifty Shades Of Grey" ] Is Not A Way That I Feel Like I Need To Be Turned On Or Like A Hole That Needs To Be Filled In Me.

I Thought About Starting A Novella Club Because It Seemed Less Ambitious.

There's A Certain Grace To Having Your Heart Broken.

I Don’t Really Read Reviews… That’s Not Where My Attention Goes.

I Think Grace [dunham] And I Are Always Working From A Personal Place, And The Fact That These Were Issues That We'd Been Talking About In Our Own Families Really Clicked, But Also Jason's [benjamin] Passion About It And His Clear Sense That This Was Going To Be Something Emotional And Remarkable To Watch. It Was Very Hard Not Get Excited About It And Want To Help In Any Way We Could.

Don't Put Yourself In Situations You'd Like To Run Away From. But When You Run, Run Back To Yourself.

Self Reflection

I Find It Really Awkward To Do A Scene Where I'm Supposed To Seem Like I'm In Love.

It's Almost Like When You're Young, Your Friends Take On The Romance Role, And Then Guys Take On The Role Of Your Friends Later.

The Fact Is That I Write Under Duress, Often In My Bed, Often At The Last Minute. I'm Kind Of A Binge Writer I Would Say, Which I Don't Support. I Was Always Kind Of That Way. Probably The Time I Was The Most Regular As A Writer Was College. It Was Like, What Else Is There To Do When You're Living In The Midwest Studying Creative Writing?

The Current Economic Climate Means Getting Out Of College Is No Guarantee Of Getting A Job, And No Guarantee Of A Satisfying Work Life. My Dad Feels That This Is The First Generation Of Americans That Expects That There Children Will Have A Harder Time Then They Did. That's A Fascinating Concept.

I Felt Like I Was A Writer, And I Just Thought Filmmaking Was The Best Way For Me To Express That, Because It Allows Me To Embrace The Visual World That I Love. It's Allows Me To Interact With People, To Be More Social Than Fiction Or Poetry, And It Felt Like The Right Way For Me To Tell The Stories That Felt Pressing To Me.

If You're Writing, You're Starting In Private. It Can Really Be This Amazing, Private, Freeing Experience. Forget That It's For Other People - That Comes In Later.

The Only Time I Felt Like A Weird Exploiter - Even Though I Knew I Wasn't One - Was When I Was Writing A Sex Scene Between Me And My Adorable Co-star [adam Driver] In Which He Had To Tell Me How Much He Loved My Potbelly. It Seemed Like A Weird Wish-fulfillment Thing, Where I'm Directing My Own Fantasy.

I Actually Didn't Enjoy Being A Child Particularly At All Even Though I Had Nice Parents In A Comfortable Place To Live. Just Because I Was Too Confused In Generating Too Many Answers For Myself That Just Scared Me More.

For Me, My Life Goal Is To Be In A Position Where I Can Wear Pajamas 24 Hours A Day. That's What Makes Me Happy.

I Didn't Drink In The Essence Of The Classroom. I Didn't Take Legible Notes Or Dance All Night. I Thought I Would Marry My Boyfriend And Grow Old And Sick Of Him. I Thought I Would Keep My Friends, And We'd Make Different, New Memories. None Of That Happened. Better Things Happened.

I Still Go To A Party And Say Something Embarrassing To Someone, And Then Write Them A Weird E-mail About It The Next Day, And Then Write Them A Text Because I Think They Didn't Get The E-mail. No Matter What Happens With Your Level Of Success, You Still Have To Deal With All The Baggage That Is Yourself.

My Relationship To Eating, My Relationship To Critiquing My Own Shape, All Of That Has Changed Since I've Started Viewing My Body Much More As A Tool To Do My Work.

I've Always Loved My Own Little Office Spaces No Matter What They Were Like. It's The Virginia Woolf, Room Of One's Own Concept, It's Really Important.

I Just Hope That I Continue To Keep A Line Between My Private Life And Who I Play, Even If They Are Closely Intertwined, And So I'm Careful. I Don't Even Know Where My Line Is, But I Know I Have A Line.

When It's Low-budget, And You Have One Other Person On The Set, You Have To Make Rules.

I Should Do The Things That Make Me Feel Cool And Smart. As I Get Older, I'm Realizing More And More That It Doesn't Really Matter If I'm Good At It, It Just Matters That I Try. My Own Effort, My Own Willingness, Are Becoming What's Appealing To Me.

It's Very Easy For Me To Say What Success Is. I Think Success Is Connecting With An Audience Who Understands You And Having A Dialogue With Them. I Think Success Is Continuing To Push Yourself Forward Creatively And Not Sort Of Becoming A Caricature Of Yourself.

My Parents Are Artists; In Their World, In The World Of Modern Artists, You Are Supposed To Just Go Into Your Studio And Tune Everything Out, And Your Entire Relationship With Your Work Is Supposed To Be A Super Private One. That Was The Way To Do It And You Weren't Deeply Truly Artistic If That Wasn't The Way You Were Engaging The Press.

I Do Think Girls In Their Twenties Accept Certain Kinds Of Lesser Treatment Than They Would At Other Times In Their Lives.

I'm Really Lucky Because My Sister Is A Real Activist Soul And Also Hyper-intellectualized In This Way That's Really Allowed Me To Wrap My Mind Around Some Of The Bigger Intellectual Concepts And Really Understand The Language Around Identity In The Gender Nonconforming Community.

I Think That As Our Country Becomes More Tolerant As A Whole Of Certain Things, Hopefully Becomes More Tolerant, There's A Way That Certain Kinds Of Bullying Will Be Passe And Unacceptable.

I Had No Clue What Anyone Was Talking About Like, You Know I Don't Think I, I Don't Think Any Of The Depictions Of Sex Were More To Me Than Just Like An Image Of Two People's Arms Rubbing Together [when I Was Eight], I Just Had No Clue.

One Of My Favorite Facts About Jason [benjamin] Is That He Collects Shirts From Tattoo Parlors. He Has A Bunch Of Tattoo Parlor T-shirts, But No Tattoos. And Then He Wears, Like, Vans And Jeans. My Boyfriend Said He Looks Like A Modern Bruce Springsteen, Which Is A Pretty High Compliment.

Guys Warning Girls Not To Fall In Love With Them Is So Truly Douchey That It Should Have A Higher Success Rate.

Falling In Love

Girls Are Trained To Say, ‘i Wrote This, But It’s Probably Really Stupid.’ Well, No, You Wouldn’t Write A Novel If You Thought It Was Really Stupid. Men Are Much More Comfortable Going, ‘i Wrote This Book Because I Have A Unique Perspective That The World Needs To Hear.’ Girls Are Taught From The Age Of Seven That If You Get A Compliment, You Don’t Go, ‘thank You’, You Go, ‘no, You’re Insane.

Escapism For Me Can Come In The Form Of Someone Else's Reality.

I'm Not Jealous In Traditional Ways - Of Boyfriends Or Babies Or Bank Accounts - But I Do Covet Other Women's Styles Of Being.

I'd Love To Write Something For A Male Protagonist. That's Sort Of The Next Frontier For Me. I Think It'd Be Really Amazing To Write The Kind Of Parts That I Love For Women But For A Guy.

I Don't Feel Like My Work Is Dependent On My Size. I Feel Like My Work Is Dependent On The Fact That I'm An Everywoman. I'd Be An Everywoman If I Lost 20 Pounds Or If I Gained 50 Pounds, Because Of My Attitude And It's My Relationship To The World And The Fact That Like I Have Two Front Teeth That Are Bigger Than The Rest Of My Teeth.

When I Was Nine, I Wrote A Vow Of Celibacy On A Piece Of Paper And Ate It.

Okay, 'best Party Ever' -- To Me, That's Like Saying 'best Gym Ever' Or 'best Nature Documentary Ever,' Like How Good Can It Really Be?

If A Young Woman Is Looking At The Landscape Of Hollywood, What She Sees Is Almost Only Challenges.

I Think Romantic Comedy, When Done Right, Is My Favorite Genre. It's Just A Genre That's Very Human.

The Biggest Fear That Everybody Has Is Dying. Not To Get Too Meta On You, But I Think Every Fear That People Are Trying To Work Out Is Really Like I'm Going To Die And No One Is Going To Care, And It Doesn't Matter Because God Might Not Exist. That's What People Are Trying To Figure Out. I Wish We All Had One Fear So We Could Think About It Together And Figure Out A Solution, But We're All Doing Different Things.

Barbie’s Disfigured. It’s Fine To Play With Her Just As Long As You Keep That In Mind.

I Had Always Written. I Had Written Stories And Poems. Then I Started Writing Plays.

I Went To An Amazing School In Brooklyn Called St. Anne's That's A Really Kind Of Creative Hot Bed.

I Can Play Very Annoying Girl, Very Lost Girl And Then All The Things In The Spectrum Between.

At A Brunch Potluck, I Realize That I Do, In Fact, Hate Everybody.

You Don't Need To Be Flamboyant In Your Life To Be Flamboyant In Your Work.

Scandal Has Made Wine And Popcorn Seem Like A Viable, Even Healthful, Meal.

My Shape Reminds Me A Lot Of My Grandmother, Whom I Was Really Close To. She Died When I Was 13, And We Have A Really Similar Body Type, The Squat New England Woman Who Can Roll Out Dough And Bring In Your Lawnmower. That's Kind Of The Vibe Of My Body, And I'm Into It.

My Parents Are Pretty Liberal. But They Were Just You Know Trying To Look Out For My Innocence Or Whatever. But My Babysitter Had "forever" [by Judy Blume]. And I Said "well I've Read Judy Blume Books, Can I Borrow That?" And She Said No, This One's Not Appropriate For You. Which Obviously, Got Me Really Worked Up. So I Took It.

Mine's [fans] A Lot Of Like Weird Guys In Prison. So I Don't Need To Answer Them.

A Girl's Night For Me Is With A Member Of My Family On The Couch, Eating Takeout, Watching Something Good, Going To Sleep Early, It's So Boring, But It's Just What I Need!

At My Age, No One Is Married, No One Has Kids, No One Has A Career.

You Get Reactions And You Connect To People And I Love Twitter.

All My Freakouts Have Been Pretty Private And Directed At Family Pets And/or People I Have Been Dating For Too Short A Time To Freak Out At In That Way.

I Have Been Envious Of Male Characteristics, If Not The Men Themselves. I'm Jealous Of The Ease With Which They Seem To Inhabit Their Professional Pursuits: The Lack Of Apologizing, Of Bending Over Backward To Make Sure The People Around Them Are Comfortable With What They're Trying To Do. The Fact That They Are So Often Free Of The People-pleasing Instincts I Have Considered To Be A Curse Of My Female Existence.

Let's Be Reasonable And Add An Eighth Day To The Week That Is Devoted Exclusively To Reading.

I Shared A Bed With My Sister, Grace, Until I Was Seventeen Years Old. She Was Afraid To Sleep Alone And Would Begin Asking Me Around 5:00 P.m. Every Day Whether She Could Sleep With Me. I Put On A Big Show Of Saying No, Taking Pleasure In Watching Her Beg And Sulk, But Eventually I Always Relented. Her Sticky, Muscly Little Body Thrashed Beside Me Every Night As I Read Anne Sexton, Watched Reruns Of Snl, Sometimes Even As I Slipped My Hand Into My Underwear To Figure Some Stuff Out.

I Started Writing Plays, But The Fact That Plays Don't Last Forever Was Too Much For Me To Bear.

I Think That It's Very Important To Be With Someone Who Makes You Feel Like The Best Version Of Yourself. In Some Sense, Your Partner Is A Mirror, And You Have To Like What They're Reflecting Back At You.

Reflecting Back

I Remember Asking My Mom, "do You Think That I Will Ever Have Enough Money To Live Outside Of Your House?" And She Would Be Like, "you Just Never Know."

Once, My Little Sister Was Walking Down The Street In Her Thick Black Glasses, And A Homeless Man Muttered, Talk Nerdy To Me.

Enjoy Going Through Life As Yourself.

It's A Very Specific Body. Even Great Reviews Will Be Like: Chubby, Portly, Overweight. . . . Sometimes I'm Like, 'ugh, How Did I Make Myself The Guinea Pig For This?' But On The Other Hand, Hating My Body Has Not Been My Cross To Bear In This Life. Which I Feel Very Lucky About.

Don't Wait Around For Someone Else To Tell Your Story. Do It Yourself By Whatever Means Necessary.

But I Also Think When We Embark On Intimate Relationships, We Make A Basic Human Promise To Be Decent, To Hold A Flattering Mirror Up To Each Other, To Be Respectful As We Explore Each Other.

Intimate Relationships

When Someone Shows You How Little You Mean To Them And You Keep Coming Back For More, Before You Know It You Start To Mean Less To Yourself.

I Think If You Feel Like You Were Born To Write, Then You Probably Were.

I'll Start By Saying That "fifty Shades Of Grey:" It's Like I Don't Have. An Elicit Confused Relationship To My Sexuality. So I Don't Need A Book Like That.

I Feel Like You Don't Know If Someone's Equipped For A Romantic Relationship Until They're Out Of Their Twenties.

Romantic Relationship

I Have Sort Of A Zen Body Philosophy, I'm Sort Of Like: We're One Weight One Day, We're One Weight Another Day, And Some Day Our Body Just Doesn't Even Exist At All! It's Just A Vessel I've Been Given To Move Through This Life. I Think About My Body As A Tool To Do The Stuff I Need To Do, But Not The Be All And End All Of My Existence. Which Sounds Like I Spent A Week At A Meditation Retreat, But It's Genuinely How I Feel.

I Have An Authority Problem.

It's Not That I Don't Want To Hear About That [blow Job] Stuff, I Just Want To Hear About It Immediately. And I Want To Hear About It On More Comfortable Terms.

I Thought I Wanted To Be A Journalist Or A Novelist.

I Never Thought Of Myself As Like, A Funny Person.

The Male Capacity For Turning The Negative Into A Compliment Is Really Alarming.

It's Interesting How We Often Can't See The Ways In Which We Are Being Strong - Like, You Can't Be Aware Of What You're Doing That's Tough And Brave At The Time That You're Doing It Because If You Knew That It Was Brave, Then You'd Be Scared.

When I Graduated College I Had A Series Of Just Humiliating Jobs That I Couldn't Believe I Was At.

What A Snarky Jerk. (obviously, I Later Slept With Him.)

But I Am A Girl With A Keen Interest In Having It All, And What Follows Are Hopeful Dispatches From The Frontlines Of That Struggle.

I Always Imagined That Having A Baby Is Something That I'm Going To Keep In A Private Place, But Maybe My Curse Is That All I'm Going To Want To Do Is Tell Everybody About What My Birth Process Was Like And What My Children's Nightmares Are.

Katherine Heiny's Work Does Something Magical: Elevates The Mundane So That It Has The Stakes Of A Mystery Novel, Gives Women's Interior Lives The Gravity They So Richly Deserve -- And Makes You Laugh Along The Way.

This Weird Pressure That Mothers Are Put Under, Like This Idea That If You Can't Breastfeed, You're Not Doing Something Properly, Or If You Choose Not To.

This Could Very Easily Be Taken Out Of Context, And I Think It's Funny Now, But I Remember Looking In The Mirror As A Kid And, It Would Be Like For An Hour At A Time, And I'd Be Like, 'i'm Just So Beautiful. Everybody Is So Lucky That They Get To Look At Me.' And Of Course That Changes As You Get Older, But I May Have Held On To That Little-kid Feeling That Was Me Alone In My Bathroom.

I Would Be A Horrible Girlfriend At This Point In My Life, Because I’m Both Needy And Unavailable.

I'm Glad If My Work Can Make A Difference.

Making A Difference

My Weight Fluctuates Depending On My Mood And My Current Devotion To My Fitness Routine.

When You're Writing A Script You Have The Option To Embellish On Life Or Switch The Order Of Events Or Make It Generally More Cinematic. I Would Stick Too Closely To My Own Experience And Not Necessarily Think About The Fact That It Needs To Have An Event Happen. Realising That I Could Channel My Own Experience Into A Story That Was Slightly More Cinematic Was A Very Important Moment For Me - Allowing Myself To Accept That The Kind Of Screenwriting I'm Doing Is A Work Of Fiction.

I Always Say That I Can Play Sort Of Six Variations On One Girl, All Of Whom Are A Variation On Me. Maybe I'll Think Of Myself As An Actor If, Like, I Do A Corset Drama.

I've Always Been Someone Who Feels Better, If I See What I'm Going Through In A Movie.

I Love Directing Scenes That I'm Not In Because Suddenly I Really Feel Like A Filmmaker Which Is A Different Thing.

I Felt Highly Anxious In A Way That I Didn't Think Other Children Were.

It Was Only When I Started Making Short Films In College And I Was Looking For Girls To Play The Me-ish Parts That I Thought, Well, Maybe I'm Just Going To Try Doing This Myself Before Somebody Else Comes In And Handles It. For A Long Time My Acting Was Just A Marriage Of Convenience Between Me And These Characters That I Was Writing.

I Think That People In The Phase Between Being Someone's Kid And Being Someone's Parent Have Always Been Uniquely Narcissistic, But That Social Media And Twitter And Livejournal Make It Really Easy To Navel-gaze In A Way That You've Never Been Able To Before.

On A Personal Level, I'm Proud Of Grace Dunham For Being So Staunchly In Her Identity. It's A Very Unusual Thing For A Young Person. I Think She's Been Very Strong About It.

I'm Not Great At Dating, But I Need To Do It To Relax.

I Really Loved ["the Love Affairs Of Nathaniel P" By Adelle Waldman]. It's Having A Really Hot Moment. Unlike Many Hot Books, It's Actually Really Wonderful. I Tend To Have That Reaction: I Don't Want To Read It If Everyone Thinks It's Cool. It Was A Really Interesting Insight Into Being Young And Male. Now That Made Me Feel Really Thankful For My Boyfriend And Really Thankful Because He Wasn't Like That Protagonist, But I Know So Many People Who Are Like That Protagonist.

We're Living In A World Where [judy Blume] Books Were Ever Banned, And Now Like "fifty Shades Of Grey" Is Being Read In High Schools. Like It's Just A Wild.

I Can Never Be Who I Was. I Can Simply Watch Her With Sympathy, Understanding, And Some Measure Of Awe. There She Goes, Backpack On, Headed For The Subway Or The Airport. She Did Her Best With Her Eyeliner. She Learned A New Word She Wants To Try Out On You. She Is Ambling Along. She Is Looking For It.

Everyone Needs Something From Me.

I Think Some People Are Really Connected To Who They Were As Children. And Some People Aren't.

I Learned That People Are Much More Game To Mock Their Own Personas Than You Would Think.

It Would Probably Be Too Easy A Cop Out To Say That Just Republican Males Hate Me. Though There's A Large Swath Of Them, For Sure.

I Value My Health And My Happiness. And I've Realized Exercise Can Give Me Both Of Those Things.

Can We Call A Moratorium On The Use Of The Term 'ladyparts'? Grazia!

I Thought About ["summer Sisters" ] So Often As I Was Writing About These Female Characters Who Love Each Other And Hated Each Other And Were Sort Of In Love With Each Other.

I Don"t Feel Like There Are A Tremendous Amount Of Roles For The Size I Am.

I've Always Had A Talent For Recognizing When I Am In A Moment Worth Being Nostalgic For.

Self Reflection

When Someone Anonymous Tells Me I'm Fat, That's Not A Person To Me. If They're Not Going To Acknowledge Me As A Person, I'm Certainly Not Going To Acknowledge Them As A Person.

Basically, Anything A Sexual Predator Might Do To Woo A Small Suburban Girl, I Was Trying.

Here's What I Have To Say About Being Married: Someday You Will Look At Him, Hating Him With Every Fibre Of Your Being, Wishing That He Would Die The Most Violent Death Possible. It Will Pass.

I Think Of My Body As A Tool To Do The Stuff I Need To Do, But Not The Be All End All Of My Existence.

I Seriously Consider Television To Be The People's Medium.

Pushing Boundaries

Like Summer Sisters Comforted Me Just Because I Was Like, Okay Things I've Seen With My Own Eyes Are Not So Terrible, And Even Though I Knew Adult Gay People And Had Absolutely No Issue With It. And I Just Couldn't Articulate What Made Me So Uncomfortable About The Space That I Shared With My Friends Becoming A Sexual Space. And It Was Very Healing For Me To Read That, And Feel Like It Was A Part Of Other Friendships, Even Fictional Friendships I Admire.

I Always Thought The Saddest Feeling In Life Is When You're Dancing In A Really Joyful Way And Then You Hit Your Head On Something.

When I Write I'm Never Really Thinking About Themes Or The Universal.

It's Not Brave To Do Something That Doesn't Scare You.

I Feel Like I Don't Watch That Many Shows With Death.

The End Never Comes When You Think It Will. It's Always Ten Steps Past The Worst Moment, Then A Weird Turn To The Left.

There Are So Many Reactions To Art That Make Sense To Me - But 'ick' Means Something.

I Love What I Do, I Love Every Minute Of It.

I Hate To Be The Person That's Like, "we're Doing Something That's Never Been Done Before."

Running Had Always Been Off The Table For Me. It Just Looks Embarrassing When I Do It. I Viewed It Like Learning A New Language - Best To Learn It As A Child.

I Took "forever" [by Judy Blume] To The Bathroom To Read [when I Was Eight] And Then I Heard My Mom Coming So I Stuck It Under The Toilet And Went Running Out. And I Went Back Later To Check For It. And It Was Gone.

I'm Ridiculous In My Oversharing; My Mom And Sister Are Very Open But A Little More Judicious Than Me... And My Father Is A Decidedly Private Person.

Confidence Lets You Pull Anything Off, Even Tevas With Socks.

It'll Be Taught In Homes That It's Not Okay To Make Fun Of A Kid Because He's Gay Or It's Not Okay To Make Fun Of A Girl Cause She's Fat. But That We Have Been Living For So Long In A Culture Where So Many People's Parents Supported Those Beliefs That There Wasn't Any Infrastructure For Children Understanding Right And Wrong In Those Situations, If That Makes Sense.

I Think We All Feel That Way When We're Young We Don't Think Teachers Have Lives. We Don't Think Therapists Have Lives. We Don't Think Doctors Have Lives.

I Think That Social Networking Makes People More Connected, Yet More Distant, So There Are People With Less Ties To Real Friend Groups And Less A Sense Of Self.

Now If You Went To Someone's House To Look For Them, You Would Be A Psychopath.

There Is No Way That My Mother Hasn't Influenced My Career. She's My First Critic. She's My Best Critic. She Has The Best Instincts From Writing To Style To Editing, To The Visual Elements Of My Career.

Aren't Most Of Us Dealing With The Fact That We Have Moms Who Either Weren't Ready To Be Moms Or Had Some Level Of Resentment About It? Everybody Is Dealing With The Different Iteration Of Pain Their Mom Has Handed Them.

I Sometimes Want To Make A Book Of Every Tattoo I Wanted To Get Before I Actually Got A Tattoo, Because There Were So Many Awful Ideas And Concepts.

The Work That's Interesting To Me In Other People Is Really Confessional.

People Are Ultimately Threatened By Young People Taking Positions Of Power.

Position Of Power

I Am Thinking Particularly Of A Shower I Took Where The Lower Half Of My Body Was Under The Running Water And The Upper Half Was Laid Out On The Bath Mat, Eating A Loaf Of Bread.

In Hollywood, You've Got A Hundred People On Set, And Shooting The Sex Scene You're Wearing Nude-toned Underwear And Tape On Your Nipples. Nothing Is Going Beyond Where You Want It To Go.

I Feel Lucky In That The Same Way I've Surrounded Myself With People I'm Creatively Comfortable With, I've Surrounded Myself With People Who Are Accepting Of The Way That I Look.

I Write At All Different Times. I Write In My Bed, I Write At The Table. I Need To Get It Together. I'm Working On A Book And Working, And Just Jam It In Whenever It Makes Sense.

My Mom Said The Term Heavy Petting Existed A Lot When She Was In High School.

My Dad Once Told Me That He Would Rather I Had An Old Boyfriend Than A Tall Boyfriend. I Don't Know Why, I Think He's Just Feels Stressed By... He' Not That Short I Just Think The Idea Of A Really Tall Guy Is Super Anxiety Producing To Him. And Now I'm With Neither Old Guy Nor A Very Tall Guy. So Everything Has Worked Out Perfectly.

On Girls I Like Being A Mouthpiece For The Issues I Think Young Females Face Today. It’s Always Shocking When People Question Whether It’s A Feminist Show. How Could A Show About Women Exploring Women Not Be? Feminism Isn’t A Dirty Word. It’s Not Like We’re A Deranged Group Who Think Women Should Take Over The Planet, Raise Our Young On Our Own And Eliminate Men From The Picture. Feminism Is About Women Having All The Rights That Men Have.

The Idea Of Being A Feminist-so Many Women Have Come To This Idea Of It Being Anti-male And Not Able To Connect With The Opposite Sex-but What Feminism Is About Is Equality And Human Rights. For Me That Is Just An Essential Part Of My Identity. I Hope [girls] Contributes To A Continuance Of Feminist Dialogue

I Felt Like My Parents Were Always Involved With Abstraction, And I Wanted To Do Something Very Specific.

My Parents Were Open About Sex. And My Dad Makes Paintings That Have A Sexual Component And It Still Scares Me.

I've Been A Little Haphazard About How Nude I Get, And The Only Thing That Keeps Me From Getting Anxious About It Is That I've Had Complete Control Over It.

Let's Call A Spade A Spade - A Lot Of Times When You Are A Vegetarian It Is A Just Not Very Effective Eating Disorder.

Eating Disorder

I Don't Want To Get Married Until All Gay People Can Get Married.

Marriage Equality

You Should Always Go Where There Is A 'you-shaped' Hole In The World.

The People Accusing Me Of Being Productive Don't Know How Hard It Is For Me To Just Bend My Elbow Sometimes.

Positive, Healthy, Loving Relationships In Your Twenties... I Don't Know If Anyone Would Disagree With It: I Think They're The Exception, Not The Norm. People Are Either Playing House Really Aggressively Because They're Scared Of What An Uncertain Time It Is, Or They're Avoiding Commitment Altogether.

When We, As Young Women, Are Given The Space To Read, The Act Becomes A Happy, Private Corner We Can Return To For The Rest Of Our Lives. We Develop This Love Of Reading By Turning To Stories That Speak To The Most Special, Secret Parts Of Us.

Here's Who It's Okay To Share A Bed With: . . . A Heating Pad. An Empty Bag Of Pita Chips. The Love Of Your Life.

I Kind Of Look Like Every Other Girl Walking Around.

I Am Not A Particularly Political Person, But, As A Tribeca Resident, The Commodification Of September 11th Is Offensive To Me.

I Always Thought That If You Had Any Real Proximity To Famous People, That Your Obsession With Famous People, Would Wane Is Some Way. Like, I Wouldn't Want To Deep Google Matthew Mcconaughey's Early Relationships For Hours Before I Go To Bed. And It's Just Gotten Worse.

I Have Work, And Then I Have A Dinner Thing. And Then I Am Busy, Trying To Become Who I Am.

I'm Always Afraid That I'm Being Unprofessional, Yet I Continue To Sign All My E-mails 'xoxo.'

I Support Selfies! I Think The War On Selfies Is Really Unjust!

We Both Followed Our Hearts And Had No Choice But To Hurt Each Other Deeply.

My Sister Is Bold, Independent, And Not Afraid To Wear Overalls. Some Of Her First Words As A Child Were "that's Not Fair," And She's Been Committed To Social Justice Ever Since. She's My Hero.

You Have To Move So You Don't Die. You Have To Move So Your Brain Doesn't Atrophy. You Have To Move So That You Look A Little Bit Like A Person That You Might Want To Be. There Are A Thousand Reasons Why Exercise Is Important, And I've Had To Find Ways To Make It Sexy For Myself.

I'm Just Waiting To Be 85 And Be In A Pajama Community. Everyone's Welcome To Join Me.

The Experience Of Directing Yourself In A Sex Scene Is, In A Way, Great. It's The Fantasy We All Have In Our Lives All The Time.

It's Okay To Change Your Mind. About A Feeling, A Person, A Promise Of Love.

Hell Hath No Fury Like A Woman Who Has Accidentally Napped.

Hell Hath No Fury

Calling Someone A Drama Queen Is So Negative. Why Not 'content Creator'?

A Huge Part Of The American Trans Population That's Often Overlooked Are Trans Teenagers. Many Of Them Are Homeless, And Those Are Not The People Who Are Necessarily Going In For A Custom Suit. But That's One Of The Reasons Why We Were Excited That We Got To Do A Contest With Hbo To Sponsor A Young Person Getting A Suit Made Who Might Not Have The Means To Do It On Their Own.

For Straight, Hetero People It's Very Easy To Unintentionally Say Something That Might Not Honor People's Identities Fully, And Grace Dunham Is A Really Amazing Educational Resource.

My Fears Came True: People Called Me Fat And Hideous, And I Lived. And Now I Keep Living.

It’s Interesting To See How Other People React To An Oversharer.

My Parents Were Very Supportive When I Was Growing Up And Have Been All The Way Through.

I Frustrate Myself As A Writer. There Are Certain Things That I'll Think, 'well, That Would Be Really Fun To Play... If Somebody Else Was Playing This Character.'

I Have To Remind Myself That When You Exercise, There Is A Natural Calm That Comes From Knowing That You Did Something With Your Body That Day. Actually Going And Working Out Makes Everything Else Easier And Better.

I’m Not Super Thin, But I’m Thin, For Like, Detroit

None Of My Actions Have Ever Sort Of Been Motored By The Search For A Husband Or Wondering If I Was Going To Have A Family Someday Or Wanting To Live In A Really Great House Or Thinking It Would Be Really Great To Have A Diamond.

Artists Themselves Are Neurotic And Fearful People, And You Can Look At Their Work And Figure Out What They're Scared Of.

No One Wants To See A Tattoo On A Stomach.

The Parts I Enjoy Playing Aren't Really Available To Me. So I Have To Write Them.

I Would Rather Spend My Entire Life Doing Nothing Than Have My Name Attached To Something Mediocre.

One Of The Reasons I'm So Proud Of My Mother Is She Took Her Skills Of Over A 40 Years Photographic Career And Translated That To A Film.

If You Watch My Movie, You Understand I Am Perverse And Weird And Angry And Not Looking To Direct A Film That Ends With A Bunch Of Teenagers Exploding Into Glitter.

I'm So Proud Of Jason's [benjamin] Work. I Can Say This And He Can't, But There's No Group Of Documentary Subjects More Devoted To Their Documentarian. The Vibes Are Really Positive, And I Feel So Lucky.

I Didn't Tell Him I Was A Virgin, Just That I Hadn’t Done It “that Much.” It Hurt A Little More Than I'd Expected But In A Different Way, And He Was Nervous Too And He Never Came. Afterwards We Lay There And Talked, And I Could Tell He Was A Really Nice Person. I Commended Myself For Making A Healthy, Albeit Hasty, Partner Choice. I Really Couldn't Wait To Tell My Mom.

I Think What People Really Hate Is To Be Caught By Surprise By Criticism.

Directing Is About As Visual As I Get And I Will Leave Artmaking To The Rest Of The Family.

I Think Women Are Conditioned To Stand By Their Man And Watch Them Make It To The Top, But Most Men Never Believe The Person They Get Into A Relationship With Is Going To Rise Any Higher Than She Was When They Met. It Takes A Very Special, Evolved Person To Be Able To Deal With Change Within A Relationship.

I Think That People In The Phase Between Being Someone's Kid And Being Someone's Parent Have Always Been Uniquely Narcissistic, But That Social Media And Twitter And Livejournal Make It Really Easy To Navel-gaze In A Way That You've Never Been Able To Before. People Taking Pictures Of What They Eat And Showing Them On Their Facebook. People Assume That People Have A Level Of Interest In What They're Doing That's Maybe Far Greater Than It Is, Although There Is An Audience For All That Stuff.

For Anyone That Has Ever Done A Sex Scene, It Takes On The Feeling Of Learning A Ridiculous Dance, Like The Electric Slide. It's Not A Sexy Experience.

My Dad Finds Twitter Just Infinitely Unrelatable. He's Like, 'why Would I Want To Tell Anybody What I Had For A Snack, It's Private?!' And I'm Like, 'why Would You Even Have A Snack If You Didn't Tell Anybody? Why Bother Eating?'

You’ve Learned A New Rule And It’s Simple: Don’t Put Yourself In Situations You’d Like To Run Away From. But When You Run, Run Back To Yourself, Like That Bunny In Runaway Bunny Runs To Its Mother, But You Are The Mother And You’ll See That Later And Be Very, Very Proud.

I Don't Really Have A Place Where People Can Reach Me Via Email Because It Got A Little Overwhelming. People Tweet Things At Me Like, "oh Dm Me For A Great Story That You'll Definitely Need To Use On The Show," Which I Don't, You Know, Dm Them.

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