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Just when you arrive at the apex of your skills, it's time to retire. But as it turned out, I decided that since it was the thing that I felt I did best, I owed it to all that be to pursue it.

Twyla Tharp

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Twyla Tharp
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: July 1
Ballet Dancer
Choreographer
Dancer
Writer
Portland
Indiana
Felt
Retire
Best
Arrive
Thing
Retiring
Time
Pursue
Turned
Skills
Decided
Apex
Since
Owed

More quotes by Twyla Tharp

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The formal education that I received made little sense to me.
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A commission is an invitation to fall in love.
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With each piece I've completed I have worked to make it intact, and each of them has been an equal high. It's like children. A mother refuses to pick out one as a favorite, and I can't do any better with the dances.
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I often say that in making dances I can make a world where I think things are done morally, done democratically, done honestly.
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Without the little ideas, there are no big ideas.
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No one is born with skill. It is developed through exercise, through repetition, through a blend of learning and reflection that's both painstaking and rewarding. And it takes time.
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I was privileged to be able to study a year with Martha Graham, the last year she was teaching.
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Creativity is not just for artists. It's for businesspeople looking for a new way to close a sale it's for engineers trying to solve a problem it's for parents who want their children to see the world in more than one way.
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Mastery is an elusive concept. You never know when you achieve it absolutely and it may not help you to feel you've attained it. We can recognize it more readily in others than we can in ourselves. We have to discover our own definition of it.
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I was fortunate to love men, so I could put them on stage and make roles for them, and move through their bodies in a way that they enjoy doing...
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The thing about creativity is, people are going to laugh at it. Get over it.
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Before you can think out of the box, you have to start with a box
Twyla Tharp
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Well, Mozart is extraordinary not only in that he became virtuoso along the lines of his father, but that he had that compositional gift, that melodic gift. By the time he was four, he was doing piano concertos with harmony in the background.
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Optimism with some experience behind it is much more energizing than plain old experience with a certain degree of cynicism.
Twyla Tharp
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I have not wanted to intimidate audiences. I have not wanted my dancing to be an elitist form. That doesn't mean I haven't wanted it to be excellent.
Twyla Tharp
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But obligation, I eventually saw, is not the same as commitment, and it's certainly not an acceptable reason to stick with something that isn't working
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Judgment is not my business. Existing is my business.
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I don't believe in rushing and saying this is done and over with. That form of rebellion doesn't make sense to me. I've always attempted to familiarize myself with the traditions, and consider that a responsibility of the artist.
Twyla Tharp
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I think people want very much to simplify their lives enough so that they can control the things that make it possible to sleep at night.
Twyla Tharp
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Perfect practice makes perfect.
Twyla Tharp