Michael Ian Black Quotes

I don't chase after things, but I put forward the effort and know the rest of it is out of my hands.

I don't necessarily self-identify as a writer, 'cause it implies a certain level of intelligence.

The thing about narcissistic people is that they don't think they're being narcissistic.

Your harshest critic is always going to be yourself. Don't ignore that critic, but don't give it more attention than it deserves.

I take my coffee like I take my women... strong... black... and proud.

Internet fame is like regular fame only without all the annoying 'money' and 'power.'

Super excited about things I'm going to do; never excited about things I'm actually doing.

You have to lead, in the case of a game show, a contestant through the architecture of the show. So there's a lot of rules there, literal and implied, that you have to navigate.

Whatever I write I publish. Because that's where the money is.

Shuffling really isn't something you should be doing on your deathbed.

I don't watch that much comedy. I think it's professional jealousy. That and a lack of support for my community.

I think in doing stand-up there are no rules and there's no architecture.

My fear is if I expose myself, not so much that I'll be hurt, but that the reaction will be "Is that all there is? Is that the entirety of you? Because it's boring."

With stand-up, you can be as freeform as you want to be. You can say what you want, how you want, at any moment without constraint.

Twitter is about creating whatever persona you want to create and either sticking with it or changing it or evolving it or contradicting it, and I've done all that stuff.

It's such a deliberate thing to sit down and write a tweet. You're putting yourself out there in a very deliberate way, and over however many tweets, you start to create a character for yourself.

The characters that I have on Twitter have very little resemblance to me, the person who's writing them.

I was very surprised how many people were earnestly reminiscing about the '80s. It's such a stupid thing to do, like, to be honestly invested in nostalgia. It never even occurred to me to do that.

I think people just love to win.

As an actor, you can show up on a set and be on a TV show for three or four years, or whatever it is and, by the end of it, you just want to do something else.

Hosting a show, even a talk show or a game show, there's so much business you have to conduct. There's so much guiding you have to do.

I'll never admit that I'm an actor, because the next horrible follow-up question is always, "Oh, what have I seen you in?"

It doesn't matter what you're chasing, when you get there you're gonna be like, "Oh, is this all? It kind of sucks."

If you say "I'm going to be an actor, but I'll get a teaching degree just in case," when things get hard, you'll just be a teacher and that's how you get stuck.

All my friends were girls. Then my mom's strident feminism for years where men were thought of as the enemy, I just didn't know what the right way to be a man was.

I never really understood what was expected of me as a man, or how I was supposed to interact with women, but worse, with other guys. I did not relate to them.

The things I care about are the most pedestrian things in the world. I care about good ice cream and being a good dad and a decent husband.

Things you never thought were going to turn into something end up being the most important things in your life. You have to learn to not try to control it.

The illustrators work so much harder on the books than the writers do. I mean, that's so much work doing what they do, and it's terrible for them.

I think writing for anybody helps you order your life. It helps you arrange your emotions and your thoughts and it helps to provide perspective.

There is something about the human condition. I don't think dogs are like "If only I was a poodle instead of a golden retriever, I'd be totally happy." Dogs are happy with who they are.

I probably should be thinking of better ideas on how to promote myself, but I don't really spend a lot of time doing it. I really don't know how to promote effectively.

Hosting a game show is so bizarre and uniquely its own thing. Anytime I'm hosting something, I try to bring as much of myself to it as I can, but it's always going to be incomplete.

The Atkins' diet is where you eat bacon for six or seven months...and the end result is that you lose weight. Because you're dead.

I hope you die.... P.S. If you do die, I'm going to go to the funeral and finger your corpse.

The global business climate is likewhatever, dude.

My goal is to work. That's the goal of most actors or performers: to work and keep working, and do the best you can, and keep growing and changing, trying to improve your craft.

If I revise a children's book, if I'm spending three hours on the first draft, I'm probably spending 30 minutes revising it. I mean, come on! But to redo a painting? That's hard work.

I'm very introverted, so it requires a huge effort for me to put on a smile and extend a hand and accept compliments. I would much rather be insulted than complimented any day.

I don't really read children's books or deal with children's books, so I don't have any relationship with them other than my own.

There's things I know I'm good at, and those things interest me less and less. I learn a lot more from doing it wrong than I do from doing it right.

I imagine there's a level of narcissism that goes into thinking you're enough.

That's been my fear all along. That I'm not enough, and I still don't trust at all that I am.

Kids love to be silly, they love to laugh, so I think it was natural for my kids to like the sort of books that I write - and it's the only kinds of books I'm capable of writing.

I think people hate me pretty much across the board, which is nice.

Part of what's exciting to me about my career is the constant looking forward. Whenever I finish one project, I am looking to what's next.

I used to need the character but as I've gotten older I need it less and less - I prefer to play some version of myself. To approach any acting job as me just being me.