Where Ideas Come From Quotes

#1. I've no idea where ideas come from and I hope I never find out; it would spoil the excitement for me if it turned out I just have a funny little wrinkle on the surface of my brain which makes me think about invisible train platforms.

J.K. Rowling

#2. Performance art is really about the sociology of the artist, where ideas come from, and the confluence of those ideas.

Roselee Goldberg

#3. Some people can sit and enjoy the view ... some people like to take photos to feel complete. I need to somehow possess it in some other way. I just have to somehow grasp it and take it home in a more fulsome way. It's where ideas come from.

Graeme Base

#4. Stories come to me and I don't know where they come from, but afterwards I can look back and say, 'Oh yes, that's got a little bit of me, or a little bit of my own son in it'. That's where ideas come from.

Anthony Browne

#5. I don't know where ideas come from. They come from outer space or God, if you like, or from my subconscious mind. But I never go ou self-consciously looking for a story.

Richard Adams

#6. When we put aside partisanship, embrace the best ideas regardless of where they come from and work for principled compromise, we can move America not left or right, but forward.

William J. Clinton

#7. How have you arrived at your thinking? Where do your ideas and knowledge come from, and why do you credit some knowledge and discredit others?

Barbara Marciniak

#8. Where do correct ideas come from? Do they drop from the skies? No. They come from social practice, and from it alone; they come from three kinds of social practice, the struggle for production, the class struggle and scientific experiment.

Mao Zedong

#9. Songwriters can't explain. You get an idea and you don't know where it's come from. And if you're lucky, you have a pencil or pen and can write it down.

Pete Seeger

#10. So where do the ideas-the salable ideas-come from? They come from my nightmares. Not the night-time variety, as a rule, but the ones that hide just beyond the doorway that separates the conscious from the unconscious.

Stephen King

#11. The answer to the question "where do good ideas come from" is always the same, the come from bad ideas. If you come up with 20 bad ideas you get one good one.

Seth Godin

#12. Where do new ideas come from? The answer is simple: differences. While there are many theories of creativity, the only tenet they all share is that creativity comes from unlikely juxtapositions. The best way to maximize differences is to mix ages, cultures, and disciplines.

Nicholas Negroponte

#13. Nothing comes naturally to me ... I have to work and rework and that's where
the ideas come from - from years of working on it and thinking about it.

Markus Zusak

#14. Where do ideas come from? Ideas come from other ideas.

Ira Glass

#15. The longer I have been on the raw food path, the more I tend to come full circle and return to where my original ideas and inspiration of wanting to eat raw food come from - and that's natural hygiene and its principles.

Kytka Hilmar-Jezek

#16. The frightening and most difficult thing about being what somebody calls a creative person is that you have absolutely no idea where any of your thoughts come from, really. And especially, you don't have any idea about where they're going to come from tomorrow.

Hal Riney

#17. I don't want to be one of these people who's like, "Man, I don't know where my ideas come from and I don't know why this works."

David Rees

#18. If you look at history, innovation doesn't come just from giving people incentives; it comes from creating environments where their ideas can connect.

Steven Johnson

#19. I'm not the new Cameron Diaz. I'm not the new Keira Knightley, either. I don't know where these ideas come from. I'd rather be thought of as the one and only Laura Haddock. I'll happily settle for that.

Laura Haddock

#20. Books are where the ideas come from, though the ideas need to be simplified, reduced, submitted to ideological purification." ("Notes on the Mono-Culture").

Mark Edmundson

#21. I don't really know where my ideas come from. I start with a time and a place. That's what I need to get started, and an intellectual question.

Jennifer Egan

#22. The real question is not where do ideas come from but where do they go.

Paul Beatty

#23. I don't know where my ideas come from. I will admit, however, that one key ingredient is caffeine. I get a couple cups of coffee into me and weird things just start to happen.

Gary Larson

#24. I come from a land where the idea of the whole world being one family is rooted in our ethos 'vasudhaiva kutumbakam'.

Narendra Modi

#25. Key is the question of where do new ideas come from. Historically, four places: government labs, big corporations, startup companies, and research universities.

Nicholas Negroponte

#26. For the novelist or poet, for the scientist or artist, the question is not where do ideas come from, the question is how they come. The how is the mystery. The how is fragile.

E.L. Konigsburg

#27. Grade A objectivity won't come from those who are closest to us. It will come from outsiders. That's where we'll find divergent thinking, unexpected questions, novel ideas, differences of opinion, and added expertise.

David Sturt

#28. Knowing where you have come from is important in forming an idea of where you want to go.

Alexander Stille

#29. 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.

Louis C.K.

#30. When you completely extract yourself from anything familiar, you start reverting back to that state of mind where you're having conversations with yourself, and that's where the weirdest and most honest ideas come from.

Alan Palomo

#31. People ask me all the time, "Where do your ideas come from?" So, to clear up this question ... I keep my ideas inside the mind of a tiny man who is tied up in my closet!

C.K. Webb

#32. The fact is, I don't know where my ideas come from. Nor does any writer. The only real answer is to drink way too much coffee and buy yourself a desk that doesn't collapse when you beat your head against it.

Douglas Adams

#33. I thought of muses as inventions to protect one's insight, to avoid questions like "Where do your ideas come from?" Or to escape inquiry into the fuzzy area between autobiography and fiction.

Toni Morrison

#34. I HAVE NO IDEA WHATS COMING NEXT OR WHERE IT WILL COME FROM; I ENJOY THE SURPRISE OF IT ALL.

Mandy Patinkin

#35. Where do writers get their ideas from? Anywhere and everywhere.
Nothing is sacred.

Darynda Jones

#36. Think about how many great works of art or game-changing ideas were ahead of their time - their creator's talent underappreciated until many years later. That's how we need to treat our young people - because who knows where the next great idea will come from?

Ashley Bryan

#37. I don't know where the ideas come from. It's just a matter of us figuring out how to receive the ideas waiting to be heard Muppet Exhibit Seattle EMP Jim Henson

Patricia Kay

#38. One of the most common questions writers are asked is "Where do you get your ideas?" But the sad truth is, we don't know. Ideas can come at any time and from any direction: in the shower, waiting for an elevator, or while bouncing across Wikipedia pages.

Scott Westerfeld

#39. Artists are interested in pictures as sources of ideas for their work. Where the pictures come from and how they are made is of little concern to them.

Van Deren Coke

#40. How do popular attitudes get formed? Do the movies just reflect it or inform it? Where does this particular idea come from? I don't know if I can say anything too illuminating.

Thom Andersen

#41. I thought the whole idea of being a conservative was to keep the government from messing around in people's lives. And yet they say the government should be getting into people's families. That's messing pretty heavily where I come from.

Edward Zigler

#42. As a leader, these attributes - confidence, perseverance, work ethic and good sense - are all things I look for in people. I also try to lead by example and create an environment where good questions and good ideas can come from anyone.

Heather Bresch

#43. The idea of the nest in the bird's mind, where does it come from?

Joseph Joubert

#44. I don't often know where my ideas come from. Maybe it's the fact that I'm obsessively regimented in my analysis, borderline autistic. But whether it's bond selection or asset allocation, we can do it better than just about anybody around.

Jeffrey Gundlach

#45. I enjoy being a student and learning. I don't think you should ever stop being a student. That's where the most creative ideas come from. Teaching is a blessing as well because I get to share what I've learned and my passion for creative movement with people.

Derek Hough

#46. The big ideas always come in flashes. I don't really craft stories that much. I genuinely don't know where these people come from, and I've often wondered if writing is just a socially acceptable form of madness.

Taiye Selasi