If a human being is filled with happiness and positivity, this is what they radiate out into the world. We each affect our environment and that collective consciousness. The more people who are diving within and transcending and are getting that happiness and positivity, the better the world will be.

A lot of painters listen to music, I think, while they paint. But I hate to do that. It's a horror. I can't really listen to the music. I'm not really concentrating on it, and I'm not really concentrating on the painting.

Music deals with time and timing. It's so magical, but when you get into it, every little sound and every little space between the sounds, it's critical, so critical. And if it's not there, it not only feels wrong, but it ruins things.

Sex is a doorway to something so powerful and mystical, but movies usually depict it in a completely flat way.

Eraserhead is my most spiritual movie. No one understands when I say that, but it is.

All my movies are about strange worlds that you can't go into unless you build them and film them. That's what's so important about film to me. I just like going into strange worlds.

I just have to think of Philadelphia now, and I get ideas, I hear the wind, and I'm off into the darkness somewhere.