James Taylor quotes: the musician’s most shared quotes.
“Never give up, never slow down, never grow old and never ever die young.”
“Being successful is good. You really have to please yourself. It’s the most important thing and it’s also best in the long run.”
“Creativity is the process that gives life to a new product.”
“We all have to face pain, and pain makes us grow.”
“No human being is ever under control, although control is one of the most important things to man. Control is the human dilemma—wanting to be in control.”
“I feel like if you let someone else create your vision, then it’s not true to you. No one can ever do as good as you want, or as good as you can yourself.”
“Somehow it helps just to take something that’s internal and externalize it, to see it in front of you.”
“To me, very much of what is artistic is people’s very creative and inventive ways out of impossible situations.”
“Once you get that two-way energy thing going, everyone benefits hugely.”
“We are part of the community, and we need investigation to be proactive, to look to the outside, to encourage people to come up with bright ideas.”
“There’s a lot more information at hand and sometimes there’s information overload and we become desensitized to it, so things start to mean less.”
“Something I do love about social media is how you can expand your idea. You can make an extension of your art as opposed to just using it for promotion.”
“I believe 100% in the power and importance of music. Music is like a huge release of tension.”
“Often you can express things in songs where other modes of communication are hopeless. Often you can express a feeling in a song that you can never get down any other way. Perhaps that’s why songs are written. Perhaps that’s the way paintings are painted or photographs taken.”
“I started being a songwriter pretending I could do it, and it turned out I could.”
“I don’t read music. I don’t write it. So I wander around on the guitar until something starts to present itself.”
“If you think my music is sentimental and self-absorbed, I agree with you.”
“I’m grateful to my audience, that there are people who will buy a ticket and come and see us play and who essentially support me and this life of music.”
“I sometimes wonder how many of these lifetime achievement awards you can accept before you have to do the decent thing and die.”
“Music is my living. I enjoy selling my music.”
“Our father was a very successful physician and academic, and we had a wonderful early childhood. Yet, instead of going to college, three of the five of us ended up in a psychiatric hospital and essentially dropped out. I came out of it with only one path forward, and that was music.”
“I think my parents’ main contribution was that they insisted we each choose an instrument and study it.”
“You find yourself in an unbelievable mess, having hurt people you love, all these grim things. But enough was positive in my life on the other side of the rive to get me across.”
“People can be so cold, they will hurt you, and desert you, they will take your soul if you let them, so don’t you let them.”
“I think people are isolated because of the nature of human consciousness, and they like it when they feel the connection between themselves and someone else.”
“Shower the people you love… with love.”
“I tell young people that the three things that will enslave you are an addiction, being in debt and having children before you’re ready to settle down and support them.”
“I would advise you to keep your overhead down; avoid a major drug habit; play everyday, and take it in front of other people. They need to hear it, and you need them to hear it.”
“I think it’s important for children to get the feeling that you enjoy yourself and that life is enjoyable.”
“Don’t be sad ’cause your sun is down, the night doesn’t need your sorrow. Don’t be sad ’cause the light is gone, just keep your mind on tomorrow.”
“Try not to try too hard, it’s just a lovely ride.”
“Certain things in life are more important than the usual crap that everyone strives for.”
“Time will take your money, but money won’t buy time.”
“I don’t know what the idea of success means to me. It carries with it an inherent quality that if I actually get what I want, I’ll have to pay for it. In other words, success carries with it almost a sense of inherent and impending retribution. It’s strange.”
“We could never have guessed we were already blessed where we are.”
“The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time.”
“Any fool can do it, there ain’t nothing to it. Nobody knows how we got to the top of the hill. But since we’re on our way down, we might as well enjoy the ride.”
“The idea of being a pop star is a very regressive thing. It’s like all of a sudden anything you want to do is allowed. You become a spoiled child when you become a pop superstar. You really get spoiled something awful.”
“Yeah, I am happy. You learn as you get older to roll with it and that nothing lasts forever. If you’re in a bad stretch, things can get better. What makes me happy now is quiet time, free time, a day off, an afternoon off. I love my wife and family, and I like to spend time with them. When I was younger, I wanted to go out and do things and engage with people and travel. That sort of restless energy to get out and engage in the world diminishes over time.”
“You have to choose whether to love yourself or not.”
“Being on a boat that’s moving through the water, it’s so clear. Everything falls into place in terms of what’s important and what’s not.”
“I’m trying to look at my blessings and how amazingly well against all odds things have turned out for me.”
“Knowing when to quit is probably a very important thing, but I just am not ready.”
“I think it surprises a lot of people that I’m still around, you know, still—that I’m not pushing up daisies, as they say.”
“It won’t be long before another day, we’re gonna have a good time. And no one’s gonna take that time away.”
“Winter, spring, summer, or fall, all you gotta do is call, and I’ll be there, ’cause you’ve got a friend.”
