I think that anyone who's pushed to do the very best that they can is privileged. It's a luxury.
It is extremely arrogant and very foolish to think that you can ever outwit your audience.
The routine is as much a part of the creative process as the lightening bold of inspiration, maybe more. And this routine is available to everyone.
The content and thematic materials of dance is, of itself, like boxing. You play tennis and baseball. But boxing is not a sport you play: you stand up and do it.
I also had a will that let me eliminate everything that stood in the way of my becoming the best dancer I could be. By a gradual process... (I) had invested every bit of my dreams, my hopes, my energies in defining myself as a dancer.
Dance has never been a particularly easy life, and everybody knows that.
To embrace luck, you have to enhance your tolerance for ambiguity.
Usually kids who are talented have the brashness to think they can do anything, but they don't often get the chance to see how close they can come.
I have learned over the years that you should never save for two meetings what you can accomplish in one.
If you're speaking of love, you really must include the element of uncertainty - and perhaps it's best approached as the art of constant maintenance.
The last two - distractions and fears - are the dangerous ones. They're the habitual demons that invade the launch of any project. No one starts a creative endeavor without a certain amount of fear; the key is to learn how to keep free-floating fears from paralyzing you before you've begun. When I feel that sense of dread, I try to make it as specific as possible.
I’m much stronger than most women. Consequently, when I work with men, or when I’m partnered by men... We can actually go into kinds of movement that haven’t been available before, simply because I’ve strengthened myself as a woman, not because I’ve weakened him.
I always find that the best collaborations are when you work with people that know what they're doing, and you leave them alone to do it.
But obligation, I eventually saw, is not the same as commitment, and it's certainly not an acceptable reason to stick with something that isn't working
I'm not one who divides music, dance or art into various categories. Either something works, or it doesn't.
when the time came I would do battle with my mother for the right to sit at the center of my own life.
As people who have commitments and obligations, we try to blockade emotions and go on our course towards excellence, and that's a lie. I've definitely paid a price. Everything is an exchange.
Whom the gods wish to destroy, they give unlimited resources.
You don't have a really good idea until you combine two little ideas.
I don't think politicians should be allowed into power who are not familiar with their bodies, because that's where our bottom line is. And I know that they would make totally different decisions if they felt responsible simply for their own bodies.
A commission is an invitation to fall in love.
I have the wherewithal to challenge myself for my entire life. That's a great gift.
I would have to challenge the term, modern dance. I don't really use that term in relation to my work. I simply think of it as dancing. I think of it as moving.
After so many years, I've learned that being creative is a full-time job with its own daily patterns. That's why writers, for example, like to establish routines for themselves. The most productive ones get started early in the morning, when the world is quiet, the phones aren't ringing, and their minds are rested, alert, and not yet polluted by other people's words.
I repeat the wake-up, the workout, the quick shower, the breakfast of three hard-boiled egg whites and a cup of coffee, the hour to make my morning calls and deal with correspondence, the two hours of stretching and working out ideas by myself in the studio ... That's my day, every day. A dancer's life is all about repetition.
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