Background Image

...

You Have To Be Able To Do A Bunch Of Things At Once, And Not Think About Things You're Not Doing While You're Doing Other Things. You Have To Be Disciplined About Not Trying To Do Everything, All At The Same Time. It's Hard And Fun.

-Louis C. K.

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

You Have To Be

Louis C. K.

...

You Have To Be Able To Do A Bunch Of Things At Once, And Not Think About Things You're Not Doing While You're Doing Other Things. You Have To Be Disciplined About Not Trying To Do Everything, All At The Same Time. It's Hard And Fun.

Views: 3

Topic

More From Louis C. K.

I Don't Like Waking Up. I Feel Like Staying In Bed Usually, But I Can't Because I've Got Two Kids Standing Next To My Bed, Just Eager To Live Another Day.

I Have A Crazy Amount Of Different Jobs, So The Way I Manage That Is To Not Do More Than One At A Time. It's Like Old Computers That Had Small Memory Chips, They Would Do Something Called Swapping, Where They Would Fill The Memory With One Task, Do It And Get It Out.

You Would Never Do Stand-up Without An Audience. I Mean, No One Would Even Consider It. It's Like They're The Instrument You're Playing.

It's More Fun To Experience Things When You Don't Know What's Going To Happen.

It's A Positive Thing To Talk About Terrible Things And Make People Laugh About Them.

Young People Don't Even Consider That It's A Good Idea To Be Out On The Fringe, Which Is Where Good Ideas Come From.

One Time, I Threw A Candy Wrapper On The Street. I Was With A Friend Who Said To Me, You Just Littered On The Street! Don't You Care About The Environment? And I Thought About It, And I Said, You Know What? This Isn't The Environment. This Is New York City. New York City Is Not The Environment. New York City Is A Giant Piece Of Litter. Next To Mexico City, It's The Shittiest Piece Of Litter In The World. Just A Pussy, Runny, Smokin', Stinkin' Piece Of Litter.

I've Always Loved Boxing. It's Something I've Always Been Extremely Excited About.

You Can't Answer A Kid's Question. A Kid Never Accepts Any Answer. A Kid Never Says, 'oh, Thanks. I Get It.'... They Just Keep Coming With More Questions - Why, Why, Why? - Until You Don't Even Know Who The Fk You Are Anymore At The End Of The Conversation. It's An Insane Deconstruction.

A Lot Of Tv Is Put Together By Teams, By Writing Staffs And Several Different Directors. It's A Great, Very Smart Way To Make Television. It's Worked For However Long Tv's Been Around.

I Love Comedians. They're My Community.

To Me, Art Supplies Are Always Okay To Buy.

Perception Is Created And Twisted So Quickly.

The Thing Is, Comedy's Gone In A Weird Direction. People Are Really Into Ironic Comedy And Fakeness And Cleverness.

There’s A Need To Perfect Things In A Writers’ Room, And That Can Take A Lot Of Fun Out Of A Show Sometimes. It’s A Struggle. It Depends On Your Personality. Some People Love Working With A Writing Staff. I Had A Great Writing Staff On Lucky Louie, But It Sometimes Felt Like Congress Or Something.

When You Write From Your Gut And Let The Stuff Stay Flawed And Don't Let Anybody Tell You To Make It Better, It Can End Up Looking Like Nothing Else.

I Was A Nerd Growing Up, And I'm A Little Antisocial And Awkward.

I Love Being Married. It's Great. But I Hate Arguing. I Hate Fighting. You Know What I Do Now? When We Get In An Argument, I Just Take Her Side Against Me. It's Just Easier; It Goes Quicker. She's Like, "what's Wrong With You?" And I'm Like, "i Know! Damn It! Argh!"

I'm Close To My Audience. I Think I Have More Tools In My Box Than Other Guys Who Might Try It. Also, I Know How To Do This Stuff. I Know How To Write And Shoot And Edit. I'm Technically Adept And That Helped With The Website. You Need A Big Skill Set.

Most People Are Dead. Hitler. Ray Charles. Some Other Guys. But Mostly Those Two.

I Wish I Could [keep A Journal]. I Have A Lot Of Journals With One Page Half Written In. I Sometimes Will Write Myself A Quick Email On My Blackberry When I Think Of Something.

I Can Feel How An Audience Is Reacting When I'm On A Stage, But When You Are On Stage, Your Perception Is Distorted. That's Something You Just Have To Know. It's Like Pilots That Fly At High Gs And They Lose, Sometimes, Consciousness And Hand/eye Coordination And They Just Have To Know That That's Going To Happen. They Have To Be Trained To Not Try To Do Too Much While They Are Doing That. So When You Are On Stage, You Have To Be Aware That You Are Wrong About How It Feels A Lot Of Times.

I Just Love Learning. I Think Learning Is How You Live. The Verb Of My Life Is Learning.

If I Found Myself Alone On Planet Earth, No Other Humans, I Would Have Sex With A Monkey In Like Two Minutes. Two Minutes. That's Really Not Long Enough To Be Sure You're Alone On The Earth, Even. That's Like... I Walk Outside, It's- There's Not Much Traffic. "oh, My God, It's Just Me! I'm Gonna Have Sex With A Monkey Right Now. Oh, No-there's A Person."

Bill Gates Has 90 Billion Dollars ... If I Had 90 Billion Dollars, I Wouldn't Have It For Long Because I Would Just Dream Of All The Crazy Stuff I Could Do With It. This Guy, 90 Billion Dollars. He Could Buy Every Baseball Team And Make Them All Wear Dresses And Still Have 88 Billion Dollars.

Sorry - Americans Only Buy Things That Come From Suffering. They Just Enjoy It More When They Know Someone's Getting Hurt.

It's Easier To Cancel A Show If It's Expensive.

I Never Viewed Money As Being 'my Money' I Always Saw It As 'the Money.' It's A Resource. If It Pools Up Around Me Then It Needs To Be Flushed Back Out Into The System.

People Don't Talk To Me On Airplanes.

My Uncles Were All Funny. My Dad Wasn't Funny, But My Uncles Were All Funny. Now I Go Back And I Like Him Better Than Them, They Were Manipulative Funny.

Most Americans Have So Much Crap, That You Could Lose Most Of It And Still Have Way More Stuff Than The Average Canadian.

I've Always Got The Road. Stand-up Makes You So Autonomous And Self-sufficient That It Really Helps With That Part Of Show Business.

Sometimes I Try To Take A Nap Before Shows. That Clears My Head.

My Kids And I Figured Out That There’s A Third Kind Of Person, And I Don’t Know What You Call Them, But It’s Somebody Who Sees That The Glass Is Always Full Because It’s Half Full With Water And Half Full With Nothing, So That’s The Third Kind Of Person. I Don’t Know What It Is.

The Jackass Movies Are Honestly Some Of The Best Movies I've Ever Seen. I Laugh So Hard At Them. Those Guys Are Geniuses. If They Had Grown Up With A Different Group Of People, They Could've Been Performance Artists At Bard College, And People Would Be Writing Papers About Them.

Breaking Records Is Not Something You Expect To Be Doing. That's Like A Sports Thing, It's Not Usually A Comedy And Writing Thing.

You Have To Be Able To Do A Bunch Of Things At Once, And Not Think About Things You're Not Doing While You're Doing Other Things. You Have To Be Disciplined About Not Trying To Do Everything, All At The Same Time. It's Hard And Fun.

All These Words We Use, Anybody Can Be A Genius Now. It Used To Be You Had To Have A Thought No One Ever Had Before Or You Had To Invent A Number. Now, It’s Like, “hey, I’ve Got A Cup In Case We Need Another Cup.” “dude, You’re A Genius!”

Anytime You See A Bit Where Some Stranger Does Something To Me, It's Me.

I Like Pressure. Pressure Doesn't Make Me Crack. It's Enabling. I Eat Pressure, And There Might Be Times When I Get A Bad Feeling In My Gut That This Might Be Too Much, But You Feel Pressure When You're Not Doing Something, You Know?

Either I'll Never Get Rich From The Show But Remain Intensely Proud Of The Work And Stand Behind Every Second Of It, Or It Catches On And I'll Make My Money Down The Road.

When I Am In A Hotel, And I Turn Off The Lights And The Tv, I Just Freak Out. I Turn The Tv Back On And Don't Get Any Sleep.

I Just Don't Trust Any Of It. Every Time I Read Something About How There's Been Another Ridiculous Climb Of The Dow Jones, There's A Part Of Me That Goes, “this Can't Be Good.” None Of This Is Real Money. You Know What I Mean? It's Not Like There's Actually More Of Anything. It's Just Ideas. When People Are Getting Richer And Richer But They're Not Actually Producing Anything, It Can't End Well.

Life Is Full Of Horrible Mistakes.

Out Of The People That Ever Were, Almost All Of Them Are Dead. There Are Way More Dead People, And You're All Gonna Die And Then You're Gonna Be Dead For Way Longer Than You're Alive. Like That's Mostly What You're Ever Gonna Be. You're Just Dead People That Didn't Die Yet.

Stand-up Is Probably The Most Solo Performance In Art.

I Killed My Facebook Page Years Ago Because Time Clicking Around Is Just Dead Time. Your Brain Isn't Resting And It Isn't Doing. I Think People Have To Get Their Heads Around This Thing. All This Unmitigated Input Is Hurting Folks.

I Know I'm Getting Old Because There Will Be Times When I'm Not Even Doing Anything And I'll Think, 'i Need To Go Wipe My Ass Right Now.'

There's Two Kinds Of Press That You Get When You Put Out A Tv Show: The Reviews, And The People That Just Decide What The Reviews Say.

I Think You Have To Try And Fail, Because Failure Gets You Closer To What You're Good At.

I Love Stand-up More Than Anything, And I'm So Happy To Have Found A Way To Use It In The Show.

There's A Reason It's Called 'girls Gone Wild' And Not 'women Gone Wild'. When Girls Go Wild, They Show Their Tits. When Women Go Wild, They Kill Men And Drown Their Kids In A Tub.

I Don't Care About The Weight. You Know, I'm Lucky; I'm One Of Those People - I Can Eat Donuts, Whatever, And I Just Get Fat.

For My Scale, How I Grew Up And Live My Life, I'm Making Plenty Of Money.

I Don't Have A Gun, But If I Did, I Would Shoot A Baby Deer In The Mouth And Feel Nothing.

I've Started To Kind Of Hate People, And It's Not Because I Have Anything Against Them. It's Just, I Enjoy It. It's Recreation.

To Me, Comedies Are Usually The Least Funny Movies. Movies That Are Actually A Comedy Are Usually Not All That Funny. To Me Goodfellas And Raging Bull Are Two Of The Funniest Movies I Ever Saw.

I Would Rather Be With My Kids Than Anybody Else.

Stereotypically Speaking Feminists Can't Take A Joke. ::audience Boo:: See?

Natural Enemies

I Have A Lot Of Beliefs... And I Live By None Of Them...

When A Person Tells You That You Hurt Them, You Don't Get To Decide That You Didn't.

The Problem Is, The More Famous You Get, The More People See You Who Didn't Choose To.

Misery Is Wasted On The Miserable.

I Am Really Tired Of Looking At My Hips. I'm Seriously Really Tired Of Standing Naked In The Mirror And Staring At My Hips For Hours And Hours While Muttering, "you Hips. You Hips Need To Get It Together."

You Can Do Eight Things. We Got It Down To Eight For You.

Every Day Starts, My Eyes Open And I Reload The Program Of Misery. I Open My Eyes, Remember Who I Am, What I'm Like, And I Just Go, 'ugh'.

Well, When I Was Younger, I Lied All The Time, Because Once You Understand The Power Of Lying, It's Really Like Magic Because You Transform Reality For People.

I've Had Soccer Moms Come Up And Tell Me They Can Relate When I Say That I Want To Throw My Baby In The Trash.

I Don't Feel Those Limits When I'm On Stage. For Some Reason, Audiences Let Me Get Away With Things. Remember, It's All Comedy. Words. Thoughts. All Thoughts Are Safe And Worth Exploring.

The Earliest Stand-up Comedy I Was Aware Of Was Bill Cosby. I Watched Saturday Night Live As Soon As I Was Aware Of It, And Monty Python Used To Be On Pbs At Weird Hours, So I Used To Try To Watch That. And I Loved George Carlin On Snl, That Was The First Stand-up I Ever Really Remember Seeing On Tv. And Then Steve Martin. I Guess I Was In Fifth Or Sixth Grade When Steve Martin Showed Up, And He Was Instantly My Idol. And Richard Pryor Around The Same Time Too, I Sort Of Became Aware Of Him, Though I Don't Remember The First Time I Saw Him.

...then I Got Divorced And Everything Changed, And I Became A Father In A Whole New Way And Found A Whole New Set Of Difficulties.

I Spend Enough Time Onscreen Looking Hangdog And Depressed.

The Last Jobs I Had Were Fixing Cars And Covering Football Games For A Local Access Tv Station. As In Driving The Mobile Van To The Field, Setting Up 3 Cameras, Teaching Depressed Grownups And Interns How To Use Them And Directing The Game From The Van And Then Wanting To Kill Myself.

Comedy Isn't Polite And It Isn't Correct And It Isn't Accurate, Even. It's Just A Mess. So That's The Way That I Approach It.

I Love Being Divorced. Every Year Has Been Better Than The Last. By The Way, I'm Not Saying Don't Get Married. If You Meet Somebody, Fall In Love And Get Married. Then Get Divorced. Because That's The Best Part. Divorce Is Forever! It Really Actually Is. Marriage Is For How Long You Can Hack It. But Divorce Just Gets Stronger Like A Piece Of Oak. Nobody Ever Says 'oh, My Divorce Is Falling Apart, It's Over, I Can't Take It.'

Falling In Love

If You Can Survive Disappointment, Nothing Can Beat You

Cars And Cameras Are The Two Things I Let Myself Be Materialistic About. I Don't Care About Other Stuff.

There Are People That Really Live By Doing The Right Thing, But I Don't Know What That Is, I'm Really Curious About That. I'm Really Curious About What People Think They're Doing When They're Doing Something Evil, Casually. I Think It's Really Interesting, That We Benefit From Suffering So Much, And We Excuse Ourselves From It.

Race Doesn't Mean What It Used To In America Anymore. It Just Doesn't. Obama's Black, But He's Not Black The Way People Used To Define That. Is Black Your Experience Or The Color Of Your Skin? My Experience Is As A Mexican Immigrant, More So Than Someone Like George Lopez. He's From California. But He'll Be Treated As An Immigrant. I Am An Outsider. My Abuelita, My Grandmother, Didn't Speak English. My Whole Family On My Dad's Side Is In Mexico. I Won't Ever Be Called That Or Treated That Way, But It Was My Experience.

It's Hard Having Kids Because It's Boring... It's Just Being With Them On The Floor While They Be Children. They Read Clifford The Big Red Dog To You At A Rate Of 50 Minutes A Page, And You Have To Sit There And Be Horribly Proud And Bored At The Same Time.

Life Isn't Something You Possess. It's Something You Take Part In, And You Witness.

When I Was A Kid There Was A Show Called 'holmes & Yo-yo' About A Robot Cop. I Loved That Show And I Think It Only Lasted Like Three Episodes.

I Finally Have The Body I Want. It’s Easy, Actually, You Just Have To Want A Really Shitty Body.

I’m Bored’ Is A Useless Thing To Say. I Mean, You Live In A Great, Big, Vast World That You’ve Seen None Percent Of. Even The Inside Of Your Own Mind Is Endless; It Goes On Forever, Inwardly, Do You Understand? The Fact That You’re Alive Is Amazing, So You Don’t Get To Say ‘i’m Bored.

Plenty Of Crazy People In New York. There Are So Many Crazy People Here, I Think It's Like One Out Of Every One Person Is Completely Out Of Their Mind.

I've Been Having A Lot Of Trouble Sleeping As We All Should. I Dunno. You Don't Live That Long. It Doesn't Matter.

In 27 Years Doing This, I've Seen A Handful Of Truly Great, Masterful Standup Sets. One Was Tig Notaro Last Night At Largo.

People Are Always Fighting For Attention With Things Now Because There's So Much Content. Actually, If You Don't Tell People Stuff - You Just Keep Your Mouth Shut - You Don't Have To Whisper It, You Just Don't Yell. Take The Bullhorn Off Your Mouth And It's A Secret.

Feeling Unsure And Lost Is Part Of Your Path. Don't Avoid It. See What Those Feelings Are Showing You And Use It.

It’s Been A Very Old Thing For People To Gather Together And Laugh At Stuff. The First Comedian In America Really Was Abraham Lincoln. He Used To Go To A Pub Near Where He Lived And Stand In Front Of The Fire And He Packed The Place Every Night And He Would Just Talk And Bust Everybody In Their Guts. He Was Just A Hilarious Speaker And That’s What He Did.

Everything Is Amazing And Nobody Is Happy

There's A Woman I See Who's Not My Therapist, But She's Like An Old Friend Who's A Therapist In Profession. She Lets Me Talk To Her Like A Therapist Once In A While, And She Does A Great Thing. Whenever I Have A Big Dilemma, Like This Is A Big Problem In My Life, She Always Says, 'wow, You're Going To Have To Figure That Out.'

I Just Always Loved Comedy And I Really Wanted To Be Good At It. And It Was Heartbreaking, 'cause I Started And I Wasn't Good At It. I Was Only 17-years-old, So I Had A Lot To Learn About Life In General. But I Just Kept On Trying. I Was Young Enough And Stupid Enough And I Had No Other Choice. I Had Nothing Else I Was Good At.

There's Been A Lot Of Simple Vilification Of Right-wing People. It's Really Easy To Say, 'well, You're Christian, You're Anti-this And That, And I Hate You.' But To Me, It's More Interesting To Say, 'what Is This Person Like And How Do They Really Think?'

I'm Not Raising The Children, I'm Raising The Grown Ups That They're Going To Be.

I Wish I Could Know Everything Ever, Like That Would Be My Wish - That's What I Hope Heaven Is, That They Tell You Who Shot Jfk And All That Stuff.

Spend Time With Your Kids And Have Your Own Ideas About What They Need. It Won't Take Away Your Manhood; It Will Give It To You.

My Ex-wife, She Really Didn't Like The Material That I Did. And That's Something I Regret, That I Wasn't More Careful About Making Sure That She Was O.k. With It. I Just Sort Of Didn't Ask. So That's How That Goes.

Bill Has Three Goldfish. He Buys Two More. How Many Dogs Live In London?

People Say, 'my Phone Sucks.' No, It Doesn’t! The Shittiest Cellphone In The World Is A Miracle. Your Life Sucks. Around The Phone.

When I See Two Guys Kissing, I'm Like, How Come I Can't Kiss One Of Those Guys? They Look Like They're Having A Good Time.

People Get Successful And They Start Saying, 'well Of Course I Am! I Was Chosen! I'm Special!' No, You're Not.

Rob Mcelhenney Who Runs 'it's Always Sunny In Philadelphia.' That Show Absolutely Kills Me And I Am Stunned By The Consistency Of Greatness It Has Maintained Over What Is Now A Record Breaking Amount Of Seasons ... How Do You Do That For So Many Years? My 14-year-old Daughter And I Watch It Together And We Both Laugh Crazy Hard.

There's Nothing That Beats Proving You're Funny By Making A Funny Thing, And Right Now There Are Huge Outlets For That, With You Tube And All The Other Stuff Online.

If You Do Something And People Think You're Stupid, Just Go For Crazy. You Get More Respect That Way Because Nobody Likes Stupid People.

A Very Painful Part Of Being A Parent Is Having Really Negative Feelings About Your Children When You Love Them So Much.

Here's A Huge Amount Of Work That Goes Into Placating A Network In Regular Television. It's Literally 70% Or 80% Of Your Workload, Is Showing Them The Material, Getting Their Notes And Presenting It To Them And Making Sure They Weigh In. It's A Huge Amount Of Work.

There's Nowhere I Won't Go. As Long As It's Horribly, Horribly True And/or Wrong.

I Read Something In The Paper That Really Confused Me The Other Day. It Said That 80 Percent Of The People In New York Are Minorities. Shouldn't You Not Call Them Minorities When They Get To Be 80 Percent Of The Population? That's A Very White Attitude, Don't You Think? I Mean, You Could Take A White Guy To Africa And He'd Be Like 'look At All The Minorities Around Here! I'm The Only Majority.'

I Don't Have A Brother In Real Life.

Friends Should Always Tell You The Truth. But Please Don’t.

I Remember The Day I Saw My Hair Was Thinning. I Don't Remember Caring Much. I Don't Care. It's Just Hair. It Never Bothered Me Much. I Was Pretty Young, Too. And It Happened And Is Happening Very Slowly. I Have A Feeling Dead People Get Really Mad When We Complain About Losing Hair.

I Grew Up In A Generation That Had Exponential Technological Advances.

I've Had Two Great Years, Probably Five Good Years. So I Had 20 Years Of Just Kind Of Uncertainty And Suffering And Ego Destruction And Poverty. All These Things. There's No Way I'm Ever Going To Catch Up To The Misery Years. It's Impossible... If I Don't Do Anything Dumb Or I Don't Get A Disease Or Something, And Then I've Got To Five To Eight Years I Think Where It'll Really Be Great And Then It Will Start To Degenerate Like Uranium, You Know?

If You Have Something To Say, Here's What You Do: You Write It Down On A Piece Of Paper, You Go Out In The Lobby, And Then You Go Home And You Kill Yourself.

Look At All The Minorities Around Here! I'm The Only Majority.

Some People Think It's Demeaning To Victims If You Ever Say Anything Out-loud About Sexual Abuse Of Children. I Don't Know If That's True.

Most People Are Dead. Did You Know That? It's True, Out Of All The People That Ever Were, Almost All Of Them Are Dead.

If I'm Not On Tour, I Can Run Down To The Comedy Club And Do A Little Stand-up. If You're An Actor, You Can't Go - I Guess There's Forms Of It.

It's Just A Big Excuse To Say Awful Things.

I Have Twitter So I Can Tell People What I Want Them To Buy And They Give Me Money.

What Happens After You Die? Lot's Of Things Happen After You Die - They Just Don't Involve You

If You Had A Jetpack You'd Be Like I Have The Shittiest Jetpack. Who's Your Service Provider On Your Jetpack? Did They Make The New One? I Hate This Thing.

Everybody Is Different. Some Comedy Is More Musical Like Steven Wright. His Is A Pillar Of Comedy To Me. He Invented A Whole Form And All His Jokes Are Poems. So It's Different. I Wanted To Do It Like George Carlin. Now I Do It Like Me.

I'm Enjoying The Work While I Get It Right Now.

I Always Tell My Kids To Cut A Sandwich In Half Right When You Get It, And The First Thought You Should Have Is Somebody Else. You Only Ever Need Half A Burger.

Everything's Amazing Right Now, And Nobody's Happy.

I Was Raised By A Hard-working Single Mother, So My First Role Model Was A Woman. My Only Caretaker Was A Woman, And I Have Three Sisters, So My Community Was Girls. I Have Two Girls, And My Dog Is A Girl. My Dead Dog Was A Girl. I Don't Know. I Guess I've Always Keyed In On That Perspective.

I'm Not Motivated To Entertain People Through Twitter, So Just By Having Twitter And Not Saying Anything, I Make People Mad.

I Look Around, Pretty Much 100% Of The People Driving Are Texting. And They're Killing, Everybody's Murdering Each Other With Their Cars. But People Are Willing To Risk Taking A Life And Ruining Their Own Because They Don't Want To Be Alone For A Second Because It's So Hard.

Sometimes I Just Want To Tell A Story Regardless Of Whether It Fits What The Show Is Saying. I’ve Been In A Lot Of Writing Rooms Where Somebody Says An Idea And Everyone’s Dying, Like Laughing So They’re Delirious. It’s Like A Black Hole In A Good Way, Everything Starts To Fall Into It, You Know What I Mean.

When I Read Things Like The Foundations Of Capitalism Are Shattering, I'm Like, Maybe We Need That. Maybe We Need Some Time Where We're Walking Around With A Donkey With Pots Clanging On The Sides.

How Do Women Still Go Out With Guys, When You Consider The Fact That There Is No Greater Threat To Women Than Men? We're The Number One Threat To Women. Globally And Historically, We're The Number One Cause Of Injury And Mayhem To Women... You Know What Our Number One Threat Is? Heart Disease.

The Ability To Just Sit There. That's Being A Person.

We Have White People Problems In America. You Know What That Is? That's When Your Life Is Amazing, So You Just Make Stuff Up To Get Worried About.

I Watch A Lot Of Sports. But When I'm Not Working, I'm With My Daughters Every Chance I Get.

You Can Figure Out How Bad A Person You Are By How Soon After September 11th You Masturbated, Like How Long You Waited... And For Me It Was Between The Two Buildings Going Down... I Had To Do It, Otherwise They'd Win.

Very Few American Parents Give A Crap About How They Raise Their Kids. They Put Minimal Effort Into It. Who Told You It's A Good Idea To Buy A Developing Mind A Video Game?

The Only Time You Should Look In Your Neighbor's Bowl Is To Make Sure That They Have Enough. You Don't Look In Your Neighbor's Bowl To See If You Have As Much As Them.

If You Think Everything You've Done Is Great, You're Probably Dumb.

There's No Such Thing As A Cheap Laugh.

I Find That When People Laugh Really Hard, It's Usually Because They're Connecting And Identifying In A Way That They Hadn't Considered. That's My Payoff.

I Do Feel A Lot Of Times Like I'm Out Of My League With My Kids In Terms Of What My Responsibility Is.

For Years, Blockbuster Video Has Edited Movies. Like The Bad Lieutenant, When He's Masturbating While The Girls In The Car Are Doing The Thing. I Rented It From Blockbuster And Sped To That Scene, And It Was Gone. I Called Up Blockbuster, And I'm Like, "i Got An Erection, And The Scene's Not There."

Maybe God Is An Asshole...of Course Not, He's Not An Asshole, He's Imaginary.

I Did A Show In New Jersey In The Auditorium Of A Technical High School ... Technical High School, That's Where Dreams Are Narrowed Down. We Tell Our Children, "you Can Do Anything You Want." Their Whole Lives. "you Can Do Anything!" But This Place, We Take Kids - They're 15, They're Young - And We Tell Them, "you Can Do Eight Things. We Got It Down To Eight For You."

Here's How My Brain Works: It's Stupidity, Followed By Self-hatred, And Then Further Analysis.

Expensive Quality Work Doesn't Cost More - It Pays.

I'm Not A Political Comedian. That's Just Not What I Do.

Every Year White People Add 100 Years To How Long Ago Slavery Was. I've Heard Educated White People Say, 'slavery Was 400 Years Ago.' No It Very Wasn't. It Was 140 Years Ago...that's Two 70-year-old Ladies Living And Dying Back To Back. That's How Recently You Could Buy A Guy.

If The Whole Country Had To Have The Same Conversation That Was Safe For Everybody, It Would Be A Pretty Awful Place To Live. There Wouldn't Be A Conversation.

You Know What, It's Not Your Life, It's Life. Life Is Bigger Than You, If You Can Imagine That. Life Isn't Something That You Possess, It's Something That You Take Part In And Witness.

The Greatest Thing About Having A Child Is Putting Yourself Second In Your Own Life. It's A Massive Gift To Be Able To Say You're Not The Most Important Person To Yourself.

Talking Is Always Positive. That's Why I Talk Too Much.

Well, I Think “likability” Is An Overused Word. I Don’t Watch People 'cause I Like Them; I Watch Them Because They’re Compelling. Sympathetic Is A Little Different... Likable Just Thins You Out. Working To Make A Character Likable Is What Kills Most Tv Shows.

When Your Kid Is Being Selfish Or Greedy And You Want To Help Them Not Be That Way, You Have To Find A Way To Articulate It And Inspire Them.

Working In Tv And Navigating Success Is A Tricky Thing. It's Easier To Navigate The Hard Work Of Starting Out Because You Just Do Anything They Let You Do, But Once You Get Into An Orbit, After The Thrusters Have Pushed You Into The Orbit, Now You Have To Navigate That Orbit. There's No Choices When You're Starting Out. You're Just Like, "please, Let Me Do Anything." But Then It Turns Around And It's Like, "we'll Let You Do Anything".

When You're A Father In A Marriage, You Sort Of Become The Mother's Assistant, And You Sort Of Get A List From Her Every Day, And You Do, You Know, You Run Down The List, And It Feels Very Much Like A Chore. And A Lot Of Fathers Live In Kind Of An Avoidance. They Sit On The Toilet For Several Hours A Day... Oh, Honey, It Took Me 40 Minutes To Go To The Post Office... But Once You Become A Dad Without The Mom There, You Have To Take It All On, And You Sort Of Activate Male Skills That You Didn't Know You Could Apply To Fatherhood.

I Don't Think It Makes Any Sense To Try To Get Anyone To Not Talk.

When You Have Bacon In Your Mouth, It Doesn't Matter Who's President.

I'm Bored' Is A Useless Thing To Say. You Live In A Great, Big, Vast World That You've Seen None Percent Of.

There's No Way You Ask Sean Penn A Question And Then, You're Gonna Be Huge !

Pushing The Envelope' Sort Of Implies That You're Inside The Envelope With Everyone Else, And You're Trying To Find The Edges On The Outsides.

I Can't Just Sit On My Daughter's Bed And Just Say 'n---' All Night And Then Put Her To Sleep. I Just Ain't Gonna Do That... I Told The Girls That These Boys Are Racists, And They're Not Nice Boys. But I Think We Can Still Enjoy The Stories About The Fishin' And The Tradin'.

You Know When You See A Mother Someplace Just Melting Down On Her Kid? She's Like, 'shut Up, I Hate You, You're Ugly!'... Any Parents There Are Thinking, 'what Did That Shitty Kid Do To That Poor Woman? That Poor Woman. I Wish I Could Help.'

All Talking Is Good, Negative And Positive. Stabbing Is Bad; Talking Is Good.

Don't Text Or Twitter During The Show. Just Live Your Life. Don't Keep Telling People What You're Doing. Just, Because Also - Also - It Lights Up Your Big Dumb Face.

I Learned That Money Can Be A Lot Of Things,it Can Be Something That Is Hoarded, Fought Over, Protected, Stolen And Withheld. Or It Can Be Like An Energy, Fueled By The Desire, Will, Creative Interest, Need To Laugh, Of Large Groups Of People. And It Can Be Shuffled And Pushed Around And Pooled Together To Fuel A Common Interest, Jokes About Garbage, Penises And Parenthood.

Television For A Child Creates Such A High Bar Of Stimulus That Nothing Else Competes. A Beautiful Day Is Absolute Crap To A Kid Who Watches Tv.

If I Do Something For My Kids, I Get A Medal, Because Most Fathers Don't.

My Show Is Sort Of A Short-film Anthology, And I'm Able To Tell Little Stories That Don't Necessarily Carry A Whole Episode In Terms Of Narrative. I Like The Audience Not Being Sure What They're Getting. I Think It's More Fun To Watch Something When You're Discovering It As You Go Along.

Self-love Is A Good Thing But Self-awareness Is More Important. You Need To Once In A While Go ‘uh, I’m Kind Of An Asshole.’

Fathers Have Skills That They Never Use At Home. You Run A Landscaping Business And You Can't Dress And Feed A Four-year-old? Take It On!

Human Kindness Has No Reward. You Should Give To Others In Every Way You See. Expect Absolutely Nothing From Anyone. It Should Be Your Goal To Love Every Human You Encounter. All Human Suffering That You're Aware Of And Continues Without Your Effort To Stop It Becomes Your Crime.

People Are Too Afraid Of Uptown. A Lot Of People Will Tell You, Like, "don't Go To Harlem. You Can Never Go There. 'cause As Soon As You Get There, They Kill You." That's What People Think. As Soon As You Arrive In Harlem, Someone Just Stabs You In The Face Right Away. That's People's Image Of Harlem: Just Everyone Standing Around Waiting For Lost White People To Kill All Day. "did You See Any? I Didn't Either."

Black People Have Slavery. And White People Have Our Own Thing-stuff We Went Though That Hurt Us That We Have To Cope With. Like When They Took Our Slaves Away. That Was Really Hard For Us. So It's Pretty Even.

I Don't Have Sex Drive... I Have Sex 'just Sit In The Car And Hope Someone Gets In'.

I Thought About Going To Nyu Film School - That Was This Ideal To Me. But I Didn't Make Any Kind Of Grades In High School.

I Found Out That I'm A Pretty Bad Father. I Make A Lot Of Mistakes And I Don't Know What I'm Doing. But My Kids Love Me. Go Figure.

It's Hard To Know Where Your Thoughts Come From, Especially When You Have A Thirst For Material Because You Need It Professionally.

A Lot Of Stand-up Specials For Cable Are Meant To Glorify The Comedian. They Put You In A Really Beautiful Theater, And Sometimes They Even Blow A Little Smoke In There To Make It Misty And Sweet. They Make The Guy Look Like He's A Big Rock Star. But Comedy's Not Really Glamorous. It Doesn't Enhance Comedy For It To Look Good.

I've Had, What, Two Years? Probably Five Good Years. Before That I Had Twenty Years Of Uncertainty And Suffering And Ego Destruction And Poverty. All Those Things. That'll Always Outweigh The Good Times.

To Me The Goal Of Comedy Is To Just Laugh, Which Is A Really High Hearted Thing, Visceral Connection And Reaction.

When I Got Divorced, I Thought 'well, There Goes My Act.'

You Can't Direct Without A Good Crew.

I Was In A Hotel Room In Dallas, And I Was Jerking Off So Much And So Sadly And Pathetically, That The Phone Rang, And I Thought It's Them, They're Complaining. ... "sir, Could You Please Stop?"

You Know, The People Who Do Indie Film And Decide Who Gets Those Little Budgets? They're Mean, Man. They're Cold And Very Cool-oriented.

I Know What It's Like To Have A Bunch Of Material That's Working That You Don't Care About. You Want To Die.

Someday, One Of Your Friends Is Gonna Get Divorced, It's Gonna Happen, And They're Gonna Tell You. Don't Go, 'ohhhh I'm Sorry.' That's A Stupid Thing To Say. First Of All You're Making 'em Feel Bad For Being Really Happy, Which Isn't Fair. And Second Of All: Divorce Is Always Good News. I Know That Sounds Weird, But It's True, Because No Good Marriage Has Ever Ended In Divorce. It's Really That Simple.

Last Week I Got A Flu That I Caught, 'cause My Daughter Coughed ... Into My Mouth.

Comedians And Feminists... Are Natural Enemies, Because Stereotypically-speaking, Feminists Can't Take A Joke And... Comedians Can't Take Criticism.

My 13-year-old Daughter Leaves The House At 7:15 Every Morning And Takes A Smelly City Bus To School Way Uptown. It's Like 8 Degrees Out, And It's Dark And She's Got This Morning Face And I Send Her Out There To Take A Bus. Meanwhile, My Driver Is Sitting In A Toasty Mercedes That's Going To Take Me To Work Once Both Kids Are Gone. I Could Send Her In The Mercedes And Then Have It Come Back To Get Me, But I Can't Have My Kid Doing That. I Can't Do That To Her. Me? I Earned That F—ing Mercedes. You Better F—ing Believe It.

I Ate Too Much And Masturbated Too Recently, You Know? It's Bad To Like Jerk Off And Run Out The Door, 'cause You Run Into Somebody. "oh, She Knows..." You Got To Take Some Time Alone To Process The Shame.

When My Kids Were Younger, I Used To Avoid Them. I Used To Sit On The Toilet 'til My Legs Fell Asleep. You Want To Know Why Your Father Spends So Long In The Toilet? Because He's Not Sure He Wants To Be A Father.

Everything That's Difficult You Should Be Able To Laugh About.

Give A Man A Fish And You Feed Him For A Day. Teach A Man To Fish And You Feed Him For A Lifetime. Leave The Dude Alone And He'll Figure It Out.

When I Take My Kids Out For Dinner Or Lunch, People Smile At Us.

When I Was First Divorced, I Started Dating Younger Women, And It Was Really Exciting. But After A While I Was Like, 'this Is Just Dumb.'

I Get Mad Like Anybody Else Does, But Being Able To Laugh About Getting Mad Is Very Healthy, And My Kids Know That.

You Need To Build An Ability To Just Be Yourself, And Not Be Doing Something.

Just Be Yourself

Trending Author

Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Vincent Kartheiser

Category