If I can get you to laugh with me, you like me better, which makes you open to my ideas
John CleeseRead
Well, the only way I can get a leading-man role is if I write it.
Interpretation
Take control of your opportunities by creating them yourself.
John Cleese's quote reflects the notion that sometimes, in order to achieve our desires and ambitions, we must take initiative and create our own opportunities rather than waiting for them to be handed to us. It highlights the empowerment that comes from being proactive and resourceful in pursuit of success.
In practice
In a motivational speech to aspiring writers, someone could use this quote to encourage them to create their own paths.
If I can get you to laugh with me, you like me better, which makes you open to my ideas
Because, as we all know, itβs easier to do trivial things that are urgent than it is to do important things that are not urgent, like thinking. And itβs also easier to do little things we know we can do than to start on big things that weβre not so sure about.
If you are leaping a ravine, the moment of takeoff is a bad time to be considering alternative strategies.
In Britain, girls seem to be either bright or attractive. In America, that's not the case. They're both.
I used to desire many, many things, but now I have just one desire, and that's to get rid of all my other desires.
When the target audience is American teenage kids, you can have problems. My generation prized really fine acting and writing. Sometimes you have to go back to the basic principles which underpin great visual comedy.
Those three things - autonomy, complexity, and a connection between effort and reward - are, most people will agree, the three qualities that work has to have if it is to be satisfying.
My problem is I am Christian, so I think other people must have success, too; it's not about me.
Through perseverance many people win success out of what seemed destined to be certain failure.
I couldn't find the sports car of my dreams, so I built it myself.
The Oscar is very beautiful, utterly mesmeric, but I don't feel any more important because I have won one. It doesn't mean I'm any better than anyone.
We don't get paid for activity, just for being right. As to how long we'll wait, we'll wait indefinitely.
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