I was a kid and I wasn't even sure if I wanted to play the drums you know? All I wanted to do was skateboard but I was still learning and taking it in so it was good.

I enjoy learning about different periods and people and then taking what's universal about the human condition and seeing where it matches up. No matter where you are certain things unite everybody.

Taking charge of your own learning is a part of taking charge of your life which is the sine qua non in becoming an integrated person.

So in my freshman year at the University of Alabama learning the literature on evolution what was known about it biologically just gradually transformed me by taking me out of literalism and increasingly into a more secular scientific view of the world.

The art of leadership... consists in consolidating the attention of the people against a single adversary and taking care that nothing will split up that attention.

That is what leadership is all about: staking your ground ahead of where opinion is and convincing people not simply following the popular opinion of the moment.

I've been the co-chair of the Non-Partisan Women's Caucus and vice-chair for several years taking a leadership role in this women's organization.

Among my activities was membership in the Boy Scouts I rose each year through the ranks eventually achieving the rank of Eagle Scout and undertaking leadership roles in the organization.

The leadership lost its nerve. Instead of taking the lead in the reform movement... they pulled the plug on it. They tried and are still trying to return the church to the dry ice of the previous century and a half.

Sometimes leadership is planting trees under whose shade you'll never sit. It may not happen fully till after I'm gone. But I know that the steps we're taking are the right steps.

Leadership - leadership is about taking responsibility not making excuses.

During the Cold War we gathered information by listening to the Soviets taking pictures of the Soviets and we allowed our human intelligence to decline.

But in my imagination this whole thing developed and I started mixing up old folk songs with the Beatles beat and taking them down to Greenwich Village and playing them for the people there.

The thing that most attracts me to historical fiction is taking the factual record as far as it is known using that as scaffolding and then letting imagination build the structure that fills in those things we can never find out for sure.

I never worry about people not taking my work seriously as a result of the humor. In the end the comic's best trick is the illusion that comedy is effortless. That people imagine what he's doing is easy is an occupational hazard.

Humor is the instinct for taking pain playfully.

Sometimes I feel I hope I am not taking advantage of my stardom.

House and Senate Republicans are now united in adopting earmark bans. We hope President Obama will follow through on his support for an earmark ban by pressing Democratic leaders to join House and Senate Republicans in taking this critical step to restore public trust.

I think what coaching is all about is taking players and analyzing there ability put them in a position where they can excel within the framework of the team winning. And I hope that I've done that in my 33 years as a head coach.

The aesthetic came along the way I think - just through experimenting and going on tour and trying stuff out on stage having fun with it and not taking it too seriously. If I had a ballgown at home I'd wear it onstage. If I found something in a charity shop I'd wear it. That's where it grew from - just wanting to play dress-up.

You earn very little money on independent films and I'm the provider for my home so I do have to think of taking one for the accountant time and again and that means studio pictures.

Actors always talk about taking their work home and I always think: 'What are you on? You just turn it off. You are at work and then you go home.'

I was gutted to leave my boyfriend at home when I started my tour but taking my pillow was like taking a little bit of him with me.

Producing is so exciting because you can enable things to happen whether it's like discovering a filmmaker who you're taking a chance on protecting a battle and driving home at the end of the day just going 'I'm so glad I stayed late at work and fought hard for that. Had my passion. Won that battle.'