It is not irritating to be where one is. It is only irritating to think one would like to be somewhere else.
John CageThere was a German philosopher who is very well known, his name was Immanuel Kant, and he said there are two things that donโt have to mean anything, one is music and the other is laughter. Donโt have to mean anything that is, in order to give us deep pleasure.
John CageI certainly had no feeling for harmony, and Schoenberg thought that that would make it impossible for me to write music. He said, 'You'll come to a wall you won't be able to get through.' So I said, 'I'll beat my head against that wall.'
John CageIt was at Harvard not quite forty years ago that I went into an anechoic [totally silent] chamber not expecting in that silent room to hear two sounds: one high, my nervous system in operation, one low, my blood in circulation. The reason I did not expect to hear those two sounds was that they were set into vibration without any intention on my part. That experience gave my life direction, the exploration of nonintention. No one else was doing that. I would do it for us. I did not know immediately what I was doing, nor, after all these years, have I found out much. I compose music.
John Cage