Philippe Petit > Quotes

“You must not fall. / When you lose your balance, resist for a long time before turning yourself toward the earth. Then jump. / You must not force yourself to stay steady. You must move forward.”
― Philippe Petit

“The essential thing is to etch movements in the sky, movements so still they leave no trace. The essential thing is simplicity. / That is why the long path to perfection is horizontal.”
― Philippe Petit

“I know it's impossible. But I know I'll do it!”
― Philippe Petit, To Reach the Clouds: My High Wire Walk Between the Twin Towers

“Life should be lived on the edge. You have to exercise rebellion: to refuse to tape yourself to rules, to refuse your own success, to refuse to repeat yourself, to see every day, every year, every idea as a true challenge - and then you are going to live your life on a tightrope.”
― Philippe Petit

“It's impossible, that's for sure. So let's start working.”
― Philippe Petit, Man on Wire

“On one side, the mass of a mountain. A life I know.
On the other, the universe of the clouds, so full of unknown that it seems empty to us. Too much space.”
― Philippe Petit, To Reach the Clouds: My High Wire Walk Between the Twin Towers

“When the towers again twin-tickle the clouds, I offer to walk again, to be the expression of the builder's collective voice. Together, we will rejoice in an aerial song of victory. I will carry my life across the wire, as your life, as all our lives, past, present, and future -the lives lost, the lives welcomed since.
we can overcome.”
― Philippe Petit, To Reach the Clouds: My High Wire Walk Between the Twin Towers

“When I see three oranges, I juggle; when I see two towers, I walk!”
― Philippe Petit, To Reach the Clouds: My High Wire Walk Between the Twin Towers

“There is no such thing as motivation in my world. I am not motivated to do what I do. As an artist, I am driven, I am compelled, I am thrust forward by a force so rooted inside me, so convincing, that it seems futile to try to explain it. Although it has a name: passion.”
― Philippe Petit, Creativity: The Perfect Crime

“The rest is usually just an inhuman amount of tenacious work.”
― Philippe Petit, Cheating the Impossible: Ideas and Recipes from a Rebellious High-Wire Artist

“Limits exist only in the souls of those who do not dream”
― Philippe Petit, Creativity: The Perfect Crime

“If it’s a problem of fire, fire might very well be the answer.”
― Philippe Petit, Creativity: The Perfect Crime

“Wirewalker, trust your feet! Let them lead you; they know the way.”
― Philippe Petit, To Reach the Clouds: My High Wire Walk Between the Twin Towers

“I know it’s impossible. But I know I’ll do it!”
― Philippe Petit, To Reach the Clouds: The Walk film tie in

“It cannot be done all at once. To overpower vertigo - the keeper of the abyss- one must tame it, cautiously.”
― Philippe Petit

“Les limites existent seulement dans l'esprit de ceux qui ne savent pas rêver."
(The limits exist only in the minds of those who can not dream)”
― Philippe Petit

“My destiny no longer has me conquering the highest toowers in the world, but rather the void they protect.
This cannot be measured.”
― Philippe Petit, To Reach the Clouds: My High Wire Walk Between the Twin Towers

“Would anyone but a crazed bicephalous being, half engineer, half poet, willingly shackle himself to a venture of such magnitude? I am prisoner of my dream.”
― Philippe Petit, To Reach the Clouds: My High Wire Walk Between the Twin Towers

“Believe marvels exist around you, inside others, within yourself. Go search for them. Gallop through life and without dismounting your horse manage (like a Cossack!) to pick up bits of otherworldliness lying on the path. Feed your imagination that way. That way, shape your destiny.”
― Philippe Petit, Cheating the Impossible: Ideas and Recipes from a Rebellious High-Wire Artist

“To fight adversity, to improvise, to solve problems, and to save the coup, I had gathered all my senses into unusual configurations, which made me grow wild and enhanced my perceptions.”
― Philippe Petit, Creativity: The Perfect Crime

“Believe in the miracles that exist around you, inside others, in you. Go look for them. Feed your imagination. In this way, build your destiny.”
― Philippe Petit

“forever. I would add to my reply as well, the borrowing of a simple invitation from the 13th-century English philosopher Roger Bacon: “Contemplate the world!” Because if we do not store in our heart a profound reverence for the miracles of nature as well as for the accomplishments of men and for their sometimes kind and illustrious way of thinking — even if our life is at its beginning and we have seen nothing yet; or if we’ve seen it all and find man evil — we will not be capable of recognizing those marvels, we will not be”
― Philippe Petit, Cheating the Impossible: Ideas and Recipes from a Rebellious High-Wire Artist

“empowered by those values, when we soon encounter them as we develop, or when they keep crossing our paths as we grow old.”
― Philippe Petit, Cheating the Impossible: Ideas and Recipes from a Rebellious High-Wire Artist

“Limits exist only in the souls of those who do not dream.”
― Philippe Petit

“Les limites existent seulement dans l'esprit de ceux qui ne savent pas rêver.”
― Philippe Petit

“I kept talking until the coup and its various acts and scenes dissolved into a liquid mass that infiltrated my veins—until the air I breathed was the plan itself. Until I became the plan”
― Philippe Petit, Creativity: The Perfect Crime

“The success of this first “official” intrusion seems to bring the coup closer to … To reality?”
― Philippe Petit, To Reach the Clouds: My High Wire Walk Between the Twin Towers

“And do not forget that the blood of rebellion flows through your veins, that around your soul meanders the river of perfection; above all stay devoted to your art — even if it is only the art of living! — above all remain loyal to it.”
― Philippe Petit, Cheating the Impossible: Ideas and Recipes from a Rebellious High-Wire Artist

“Therefore my advice would encompass the following nine commandments:      Do not get used to a sole body language.      Do not establish a doctrine.      Surprise yourself.      Dream in a loud voice.      Invent.      Keep diligent, mysterious and secret.      Have a just and generous heart.      Compassion, yes; but no remorse.      Acquire a thirst for excellence.”
― Philippe Petit, Cheating the Impossible: Ideas and Recipes from a Rebellious High-Wire Artist

“Why does almost every ad agency in the world set the time on a watch at 10:10 before photographing it?”
― Philippe Petit, Creativity: The Perfect Crime