The magic doesn't come from within the director's mind, it comes from within the hearts of the actors.
James CameronRead
To convince people to back your idea, you've got to sell it to yourself and know when it's the moment. Sometimes that means waiting. It's like surfing. You don't create energy, you just harvest energy already out there.
Interpretation
To persuade others about your idea, first believe in it yourself and recognize the right timing.
James Cameron emphasizes the importance of self-belief and patience in advocating for your ideas. Just as a surfer waits for the right wave, one must cultivate an understanding of when to present and push their concepts while being attuned to the existing energy and opportunities around them.
In practice
During a team meeting to pitch a new project idea.
The magic doesn't come from within the director's mind, it comes from within the hearts of the actors.
I tend to like strong female characters. It just interests me dramatically. A strong male character isn't interesting because it has been done and it's so cliched. A weak male character is interesting: somebody else hasn't done it a hundred times. A strong female character is still interesting to me because it hasn't been done all that much, finding the balance of femininity and strength. [From a 1986 Fangoria interview]
But failure has to be an option in art and in exploration - because it's a leap of faith. And no important endeavor that required innovation was done without risk. You have to be willing to take those risks.
Pick up a camera. Shoot something. No matter how small, no matter how cheesy, no matter whether your friends and your sister star in it. Put your name on it as director. Now you're a director. Everything after that you're just negotiating your budget and your fee.
Every time you dive, you hope you'll see something new - some new species. Sometimes the ocean gives you a gift, sometimes it doesn't.
I'm a storyteller; that's what exploration really is all about. Going to places where others haven't been and returning to tell a story they haven't heard before.
I've said that if you're not doing something that you're passionate about, you're compromising yourself every single day.
I train every day of my life as they have never trained a day in theirs.
Most dreams die a slow death. They're conceived in a moment of passion, with the prospect of endless possibility, but often languish and are not pursued with the same heartfelt intensity as when first born. Slowly, subtly, a dream becomes elusive and ephemeral. People who've lost their own dreams become pessimists and cynics. They feel like the time and devotion spent on chasing their dreams were wasted. The emotional scars last forever.
The world is the great gymnasium where we come to make ourselves strong.
Difficulties in your life do not come to destroy you, but to help you realise your hidden potential and power, let difficulties know that you too are difficult.
We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.
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