Top 363 Tension Quotes

Every time an artiste goes on stage, he thinks ‘I hope today goes well and I hope I give my best.’ That is important – that little bit of nervousness or tension is what makes you perform better.

Music in movies is all about dissonance and consonance, tension and release.

I’ve always tried to stray towards characters who are way more faceted than your standard leading man role, and I’ve been fortunate to play some parts who have this awkward tension to them.

I think there is always romantic tension between Lois Lane and Clark Kent.

Good planning is important. I’ve also regarded a sense of humor as one of the most important things on a big expedition. When you’re in a difficult or dangerous situation, or when you’re depressed about the chances of success, someone who can make you laugh eases the tension.

There’s always been in my life that tension between living and writing. For me, because I’m so physically exuberant, it was extra hard to sit still at the desk and put in the hours that you need to put in to write.

In California, there is a strong tension between north and south.

A lot of shows peak after a series and never get it back, but ‘Breaking Bad’ keeps the tension up all the time.

Doing nothing means unplugging from the compulsion to always keep ourselves busy, the habit of shielding ourselves from certain feelings, the tension of trying to manipulate our experience before we even fully acknowledge what that experience is.

When I would walk down the runway back in the late 90s, I could feel the tension from others who knew I was transgender. I could see the joy on the faces of people from my community, elated to see someone represent them.

There’s a constant tension in climbing, and really all exploration, between pushing yourself into the unknown but trying not to push too far. The best any of us can do is to tread that line carefully.

I did not like ‘The Hurt Locker.’ It’s a lazy way to make a movie, frankly. I could put you on the edge of your seat quite easily, and have you feel the tension for 2 hours, if every other scene practically is, ‘Should we cut the red wire or the green wire?’

The world is all gates, all opportunities, strings of tension waiting to be struck.

To be a human being is to be in a state of tension between your appetites and your dreams, and the social realities around you and your obligations to your fellow man.

If you are inflexible in the body, look at what you are holding onto unnecessarily in your life. Release tension, and life will open up.

Ethnic divisions can definitely be exacerbated by a lack of natural resources, but those tensions become violent when people manipulate them for their own political gain.

There is always tension in women’s gymnastics between athleticism, grace, performance, and eros.

When I was very young, my background as a Sikh-American made me aware of the tensions that underlie choice.

So what does a good teacher do? Create tension – but just the right amount.

I like connecting the abstract to the concrete. There’s a tension in that. I believe the reader or listener should be able to enter the poem as a participant. So I try to get past resolving poems.

Donald Trump tests the limits of campaign speech. He makes false statements and refuses to correct them. He attacks other religions and ethnic groups, inflaming domestic tension and foreign terrorist rage.

From the beginning, Christianity has struggled to sustain the creative tension between the personal appropriation of the gospel and the gospel’s universal reach.

War alone brings up to their highest tension all human energies and imposes the stamp of nobility upon the peoples who have the courage to make it.

I write in order to attain that feeling of tension relieved and function achieved which a cow enjoys on giving milk.

There’s a constant tension between the excitement of new people and security with one person. If you go with excitement, you create chaos; you hurt people. There’s jealousy, and it gets very messy. If you have security, it can be boring, and you die inside because of all the opportunities missed.

Japan is opposed to any actions that escalate tensions in the South China Sea.

I’m looking for an intensity of focus. It’s a bit like tuning a guitar string. You tighten and tighten, and nothing really changes until you hit that tension, and suddenly it’s there: you’ve got a note.

I don’t find any kind of tension very productive, I find it destructive, actually.

Economists love to talk about incentives, but the bottom line is that people hate being controlled or manipulated, even when done through voluntary institutions. This is one of the most important tensions in capitalism.

I learned very early that an audience would relax and look at things differently if they felt they could laugh with you from time to time. There’s an energy that comes through the release of tension that is laughter.

I believe our emotional tension can manifest itself physically.

Temperament and tightness often go together. But if you’re tight, you can’t sing. So I have to have that tension in my body but not in my voice.

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be the best, but when it takes over the joy in the moment, and the joy in the journey, then that’s where there’s an internal tension. And I have to surrender that.

Louise Bonnet is a Los Angeles-based painter of round, fleshy, almost obscene shapes and people. But hers is a very clean, friendly cartoon world, so there’s this tension between harmlessness and perversion that is totally unsettling.

If I feel there’s any weird tension or not a very nice vibe going on, I just remove myself from the situation.

Our Cuba policy was a major obstacle to getting things done in the hemisphere and a source of tension around the world.

Our problem as a country is that most of us do not want to join the euro, and we wish to stay aloof from the common frontiers of the free-travel Schengen area. This makes our relationship with the E.U. fraught with tension and trouble.

Tension can be useful, exciting, flirtatious, strength-building, or destructive. Put yourself in charge of how you direct it.

If you ask what is the single most important key to longevity, I would have to say it is avoiding worry, stress and tension. And if you didn’t ask me, I’d still have to say it.

‘Game of Thrones’ isn’t all about magic – it’s way more about political scheming and family tensions – but to be a part of this exclusive magic club is actually really cool.

There’s always very high tension with dance auditions! You’re in a group, watching the people in the front of the room, hoping you’ll get something, anything that will relieve a bit of the stress.

The media role in highlighting racial incidents only serves to exacerbate tension. We rarely write about racial harmony.

The average session takes about one to two hours. It’s totally amazing because when a person breathes, they go through one stage of relaxation after another, and every stage releases tension.

There’s a tension in Washington that was undeniable. I could write my name in the air there.

I know from my experience in theater that the crowd is different every night; the reactions, the tension. But it’s true for film as well, going from country to country and culture to culture. The difference between California and New York responses, for example. It’s really fascinating.

I associate a family as the safest place in the world. So when it comes to things that scare me, introducing instability and tension into where you’re supposed to be the safest really strikes a chord with me.

I believe some of the tensions the U.S. has had with Russia and that the Europeans have had with Russia… China is taking advantage of some of those dealings.

For ‘Boxers and Saints’, the tension between Eastern and Western ways of thinking was very personal for me, and I needed to control every aspect.

I think there is this cliche of Indian men who want a forward-thinking girlfriend but a traditional wife. I think that creates tension in a marriage.

When a horse is feeling good, you can sense that, a lot like the tension a fisherman feels on his line when he hooks something.

I wrote Steve Carell’s last episode. I think it was a really good episode, but there’s always a tension between what’s good for the series and what’s good for an episode, because the more closure you put on an episode, the more significant feeling it is.

There’s something really interesting about having those close friends that you’ve had incredible times with but growing up and away from them. The underlying tensions, the shifting in the group dynamic, the little lies you tell to big yourself up: it’s something that happens to us all.

Tensions exist in any free society. But the freedom we enjoy rests on a foundation of individual liberty and shared moral values.

Prom has all the elements of a popular story. It reeks of all-Americanness, tension, drama. It has romance. Pretty dresses. Dancing. Limos. High school. Coming of age.

Good stories are driven by conflict, tension, and high stakes.