Sharon Van Etten's Quotes

Everything will be okay. I have a sticker on my laptop that says that.

Honestly, live is my favorite way of performing. Every show is a completely different energy.

I don't want to bury anything in poetry.

I guess I usually write when I'm in a really intense headspace, because it's my form of self-therapy.

I hate putting negative energy out into the world. But it's either inside or out. I mean, it's either get an ulcer or have a fight.

I have this red cardigan that my friend Coco gave me that has holes for thumbs. It's my cozy sweater. I wear it a lot.

I love being domestic: making coffee, just putting on a record, and just sitting, not doing anything. It's so great.

I try to focus on the melodies and try to make everything else minimal. The melody and the lyrics are most important to me.

I'm getting bored performing the same songs over and over. Songwriting comes and goes.

I'm really out of touch with myself emotionally. I've always had a hard time talking about how I feel.

I'm still learning how to be comfortable touring. I haven't found that balance yet.

I'm trying to learn how to cook.

I've always been really shy. I was always afraid of any kind of confrontation.

I have a day job Monday to Friday. I work at a record label in Brooklyn called Ba Da Bing. It's a great indie label and I listen to music all day. I meet people online and find out about the cool new music blogs.

I think there are times in a lot of people's pasts where they've unintentionally fallen in love with really damaged people. You go out with someone who's a mess so you can feel less of a mess.

Moving to New York City and doing what I do, social anxiety is a really ridiculous kind of curse to have. But I met people along the way who deal with it - performers as well - and they are learning to deal with it daily and deal with it in different ways.

My mom used to ask me when I was gonna write a happy song. I still tell her that it's when I start to write really happy-sounding songs that everyone needs to start worrying.

One day when I have a band I will have a band name, but since it's just me I feel it should just be my name. For me it doesn't make much sense since the music is from me and about me. I haven't ever been in a band.

The only thing that's helped me get through some really hard times was just being able to write and express - it's very cathartic for me. I'm hoping that, by writing and performing for other people, it affects them the same way.

Writing songs helped me figure out how to communicate with other people. I finally figured out that if I could express something in a song, I could probably express it in my real life, too.

I do not go down and sit in front of the computer and make myself write; that's not my style.

I can't write a scene unless I've visualized it. Unless I can actually see it, and that's why a lot of reviewers have said my books are very cinematic, because I actually do see them before I write them.

I mean, if you lined up 100 writers, you'd get 100 different ways in which they write. There's no right way or wrong way to do it; it's whatever your process is.