35 Quotes by Michael Arndt

I like to begin every screenplay with a burst of delusional self-confidence. It tends to fade pretty quickly, but (for me, at least) there doesn't seem to be any other way to start writing a script.

The way you think either stands in your way or assists you in achieving your goals.

Adversity challenges the masks we hide behind, revealing sides of ourselves we have not yet comfortably with the world outside. It is why we dislike adversity, because we have to face what we don't yet understand about ourselves.

The great thing about the animation process is that is goes from, I write the lines, it goes to the actors, the actors bring a whole world to that, they bring the characters to life, then it goes to the animators, then it goes to the editor who cuts it together, and then you screen it and it goes back through the system again.

My thing is that most scripts arent bad scripts, theyre just not finished yet.

I had read enough mediocre scripts and was determined not to inflict another one on the world.

Who you think you are is only a thought.

I figured I’d probably write 50 scripts in my life. Out of those 50, I figured maybe five would be produced, and that maybe one or two would be successful. So I always kind of expected I’d write at least one successful film in my life. [...] The way it all came together was kind of like Murphy's law in reverse—I don’t expect that kind of experience again any time soon.

We have the freedom to excel or inhibit our potential. You are the grand designer of your thoughts and emotions. At some level or another you are the one who chooses which thoughts to accept and which ones to ignore. That can be a very empower realization.