“I meditate an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening. Once a y...” — Rivers Cuomo Quote

I meditate an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening. Once a year I go away for a long retreat. And overall, I just feel more comfortable in my own skin and less anxious, less sad, less fearful.

With no faith, purely as a scientific experiment, I started meditating and watched if it changed my music. It did, but it didn't make it more mellow. It made it easier to get into the flow of creativity.

At 18, I moved to L.A. with my heavy metal band Avant Garde, which was very much influenced by Metallica. At 19, I got a job at Tower Records, and everything started to change very quickly. I started listening to the Velvet Underground, Pixies, early Nirvana, Sonic Youth, and also earlier music like the Beatles.

I'm often troubled by a very strong instinct to share everything that's going on with me. I want to feel that connection, even with people I don't know. Then this other voice says, 'That's not prudent. People will use what you've said to hurt you.'

I'm scared about everything. I'm an anxious worrier. I worry about the downside of everything.

I'm totally an anxious mess all the time. There's a constant dialogue going on in my brain, and it's just reminding me of all the failures that I have had, and all of the things I need to do, and all of the things I'm not doing good enough.

I used to be really afraid and anxious of taking on too much, and the older I'm getting, the more fearless I'm becoming. Life is so much more relaxed when you're like that.

The only time I'm relaxing is when I have the puck and controlling the puck. If I don't have it, I'm getting anxious, and I want to have it.