People still call me the eternal amateur. After all, professionals are supposed to be able to conduct everything. But I can't unless I feel some connection inside. Conducting is not an end in itself for me.
One of the most stubborn barriers to patient empowerment is the cultural assumption that since the way professionals learned was hard, you must need to be really smart, and you need to be taught in a carefully thought out, methodical sequence.
Before I joined professional baseball, I started umpiring in San Diego, California. I worked 155 games in a five-month season. For three years in a row, I was working tripleheaders on Saturday and doubleheaders on Sunday.
You're a person a lot longer before and after you're a professional athlete. People always say to me, 'Your image is this, your image is that.' Your image isn't your character. Character is what you are as a person. That's what I worry about.
I used to write when I was in the mood or felt inspired. Anymore, I write whether I feel inspired or not. It's a discipline. So that's definitely different. It's part of maturing as a person and as a professional.
I spent several years acquiring the obsessive, day-to-day discipline that's needed if you want to write professionally, then several more, highly valuable years studying fiction writing at the University of Iowa.
I cycle, I take an hour's strenuous walk in the evening, I play tennis twice a week with a trainer, and I sail. I used to ride horses professionally - I'd ride seven or eight horses a day, so I had to be fit for that.
It is by now beyond question that Elton John is a competent and classy entertainer. Few people who have achieved his popularity have succeeded in maintaining his standards for performance and professionalism.
Money is not a motivating factor. Money doesn't thrill me or make me play better because there are benefits to being wealthy. I'm just happy with a ball at my feet. My motivation comes from playing the game I love. If I wasn't paid to be a profession...
Working with the children on 'Matilda' has been a joy. They don't do this professionally - their sense of discovery is instinctive, and the challenge for us adults is to keep that going in ourselves when we're doing it for the fiftieth or the hundred...
I think my cooking these days is a lot more relaxed from when I was working in professional kitchens. Spending time in people's kitchens made me realize that people want to eat healthy meals that are easy to prepare, with minimal ingredients that can...
January 14, 2000, was my first time on stage, and I've been hooked ever since. I got discovered nationally in Seattle by the now-defunct HBO Comedy Festival, and that led to an appearance on 'Jimmy Kimmel Live' and a path to a professional comedy car...
I play football in training all the time with my male friends, who are also professionals. But playing together in competition? I just don't see it. We have the ability, we have the technique, we have the tactical understanding, but there are physica...
I spend a lot of my time on the phone, pestering people. 'What's new in your lab? Can I come visit your lab? When can I come visit your lab?' I'm basically a professional pesterer.
My first years on tour, I tried to be super professional by considering the yardages to every feature and hazard. Over time my caddie and I noticed I play better when we keep it simple. Think about the distance you want the ball to fly, and only that...
Madonna is an athlete; she has to be treated like a professional athlete. She doesn't work out for six hours a day, though, like some of the press says. She never works out for more than two hours a day, and then only when she has the time.
For me, the fall of the Wall came at the exact right time because, I mean, I was 17, basically I hadn't missed anything, unlike the generation of my parents, who were deprived of a lot of things. They couldn't travel, and they couldn't really get ahe...
You'd think experienced political professionals would know better than to place their trust in exit polls, notoriously inaccurate surveys that had John Kerry winning the 2004 election by five points when he actually lost by three.
Mathilda: [opens rubbing alcohol over drug stash] Léon: What are you doing? Mathilda: You said no women, no kids. Who do you think this is gonna kill, junkies and monkeys?
Pauly: C'mon, asshole! C'mon faggot. C'mon, gun trick. Léon: Hey, what about the ring trick, you've heard that one? Pauly: Ring trick? C'mon, asshole. I'm waiting. Show it to me, motherfucker!
If money can't be made reporting and writing articles, then professionals simply can't do it anymore. Unless we adopt the position that the amateur blogosphere is really capable of taking on the role that the 'New York Times' and CNN play, then we do...
