Quote

Life is suffering. We have desires and expectations and egos, and we compare the reality we have, which is miraculous and wondrous, with this reality we desire. That somehow distances us from actually taking part fully with the reality we do have, and that creates suffering. For me, the thing that I love is that it's all about the present moment.

Alan Ball

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Alan Ball
Age: 67
Born: 1957
Born: May 13
Director
Executive Producer
Film Director
Film Producer
Playwright
Screenwriter
Showrunner
Television Producer
Writer
Atlanta
Georgia
Alan Erwin Ball
Life
Actually
Desires
Moment
Somehow
Distances
Desire
Fully
Egos
Moments
Expectations
Wondrous
Reality
Distance
Miraculous
Part
Taking
Ego
Thing
Present
Compare
Love
Suffering
Creates

More quotes by Alan Ball

Image
I think the world is a place for oddballs and freaks. I'm only interested in oddballs and freaks as characters.
Alan Ball
Image
Obviously death is a theme I'm fascinated by.
Alan Ball
Image
It's a great thing when you realize you still have the ability to surprise yourself. Makes you wonder what else you can do that you've forgotten about.
Alan Ball
Image
I am so spoiled. I cannot watch a show where it gets interrupted for ads. I have to TiVo it and skip through the ads, because the culture of advertising is so false and phony that I just... ugh, you know?
Alan Ball
Image
I'm not like J.K. Rowling, where I know there's going to be this number of seasons, and I know exactly what's going to happen. I would be so bored if that was the case. There would be no journey. There would be nothing to discover.
Alan Ball
Image
I really love storytelling, and I love the stories as they reveal themselves. It's an incredibly nourishing process it's probably the closest I come to having a religion.
Alan Ball
Image
I was conveniently bisexual for a long time, and then I went, 'Come on, who am I kidding?' And I have to say, it was the single biggest step I took toward emotional well-being, to stop feeling like I had to hide who I am.
Alan Ball
Image
I'm from the South, so while I personally find it impossible to live there, I still have a fondness for it as a geographical region.
Alan Ball
Image
The ego is kind of a big, unwieldy thing. It's not so easily tamed or subdued.
Alan Ball
Image
I believe forgiveness is possible for everybody, for everything, but I'm a Buddhist.
Alan Ball
Image
As a culture, we are not comfortable with mortality. We do not accept it the way other cultures do. We cling to youth, and we don't want to die. It's like, 'Well, too bad, we do.'
Alan Ball
Image
Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once and it's too much. My heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst.
Alan Ball
Image
There are times when I am directing, and there are a couple of moments I didn't get the way I wanted, but I know I still have other angles to shoot and I have to be done by noon I move on.
Alan Ball
Image
I definitely see the good in people. Certainly in my own life I strive to be somebody who is functional and well adjusted and can face conflict in a non-emotional and non-destructive way, and those are the people I try to surround myself with in my life. But as characters, they bore me.
Alan Ball
Image
The difference between film and TV is the pace. You don't have the leisure of time in television.
Alan Ball
Image
And as I stumbled onto Eastern philosophy and Buddhism, it was the first time I had ever read any sort of philosophy that really made a tremendous amount of sense. What I liked that was missing from my experience of Christianity growing up was a sort of acceptance, a sort of being OK with being imperfect and not focusing on the sin.
Alan Ball
Image
I felt pride, wonderful pride, when I was captain. It was an honour to take over from Labby. Anybody who has ever captained a big club, which Everton are, will tell you it's a great honour.
Alan Ball
Image
I'm at the point in my life where I don't want to work as hard. Actually, I've had to take a good hard look at workaholism and it's effect on one's mental health.
Alan Ball
Image
Directing is physically exciting because there's a ticking clock, you're working with people, it's very social, it's very enjoyable.
Alan Ball
Image
Death is a companion for all of us, whether we acknowledge it or not, whether we're aware of it or not, and it's not necessarily a terrible thing.
Alan Ball