I had to resign myself, many years ago, that I’m not too articulate when it comes to explaining how I feel about things. But my music does it for me, it really does.

Happiness is within the reach of everyone, rich or poor. Yet comparatively few people are happy. I believe the reason for this is that the majority don’t recognize happiness even when it is within their grasp.

I hope that what you take away from my album is not just the music – which I did want to be fun, and I did want it to be about individuality, but please also take away from it that there’s no dream that’s too big.

I live half the year on Necker, a tiny island in the Caribbean, and it’s always full of people in party mode. Everyone comes up to the big house, and we’ll be dancing until the early hours to the island’s band, the Front Line.

On TV the people can see it. On radio you’ve got to create it.

I definitely think, generally, rap is misogynistic.

What makes us human, I think, is an ability to ask questions, a consequence of our sophisticated spoken language.

You can’t imagine parlor ballads drifting out of high-rise multi-towered buildings. That kind of music existed in a more timeless state of life.

When marrying, ask yourself this question: Do you believe that you will be able to converse well with this person into your old age? Everything else in marriage is transitory.

I’ve always tended to write songs prolifically.

Back, you know, a few generations ago, people didn’t have a way to share information and express their opinions efficiently to a lot of people. But now they do. Right now, with social networks and other tools on the Internet, all of these 500 million people have a way to say what they’re thinking and have their voice be heard.

I was also a junior and I know how you learn from seniors, that’s how you follow. Speeches don’t work.

Why love if losing hurts so much? I have no answers anymore; only the life I have lived. The pain now is part of the happiness then.

It’s almost schizophrenic who I portray in my music.

To all the musicians who are making reggaeton, let’s put some more effort into it and bring something new to the people!

I write from my soul. This is the reason that critics don’t hurt me, because it is me. If it was not me, if I was pretending to be someone else, then this could unbalance my world, but I know who I am.

In one day, I have times where I’m feeling great, I feel like I love my life, and then 2:30 rolls around and I’m the angriest man alive. My wife sees it.

My body is damaged from music in two ways. I have a red irritation in my stomach. It’s psychosomatic, caused by all the anger and the screaming. I have scoliosis, where the curvature of your spine is bent, and the weight of my guitar has made it worse. I’m always in pain, and that adds to the anger in our music.

Of all forms of caution, caution in love is perhaps the most fatal to true happiness.

Verbosity leads to unclear, inarticulate things.

I booked my first studio at like 12 or 13. Somewhere in that season of my life, singing along with the radio became me wanting to be on radio, you know.

Talk that does not end in any kind of action is better suppressed altogether.

Persuasion is clearly a sort of demonstration, since we are most fully persuaded when we consider a thing to have been demonstrated.

Smiling makes me feel weak and not in control and not powerful and small.

From the beginning of my rap career, since I was seen and heard, I always had a store.

I’m not ashamed to say I fear something.

If merely ‚feeling good‘ could decide, drunkenness would be the supremely valid human experience.

I can write a song in about an hour if it’s a simple country song.

I can express myself.

Whenever I think about movies, I always look at that art process as having the best of a lot of worlds. Because if you watch a great film, you have a musical element to it, not just on the scoring, but in the way that the shots are edited – that has music and rhythm and time.

We’re more popular than Jesus now; I don’t know which will go first, rock ‚n‘ roll or Christianity.

I have never been a quitter. To leave office before my term is completed is opposed to every instinct in my body. But as president I must put the interests of America first Therefore, I shall resign the presidency effective at noon tomorrow.

Talk to a man about himself and he will listen for hours.

I like to write about love and love lost because I feel like there are so many different subcategories of emotions that you can possibly delve into.

The most successful politician is he who says what the people are thinking most often in the loudest voice.

I think people should feel encouraged to be themselves.

My purpose is to make exciting music, and I feel like I’ll be doing that for the rest of my life, so there’s no pressure.

I loved being Maleficent. I was quite sad to put my staff down and put my horns away because somehow, she just lives in a different world.

I have had fun being who I became, so to speak.

I learned from my dog long before I went to Gombe that we weren’t the only beings with personalities. What the chimps did was help me to persuade others.

Stage actors are usually much more conscious of speaking up and making sure that everyone can hear in the back of the theatre; a film actor probably thinks of that a little less.

Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion. I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning up to do afterward.

Whenever I make music, it reflects where I’m at mentally.

A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself.

I try to devote my afternoons to making music in my home studio, but it’s a lot more fun hanging out with musicians and friends, and trying subtly to influence a band than making your own stuff.

I’m the most boring person to talk to.

Hatred is settled anger.

I’m a spokesman for myself. It just so happens that there’s a bunch of people that are concerned with what I have to say. I find that frightening at times because I’m just as confused as most people. I don’t have the answers for anything.

Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one.

I’m just writing, writing, writing. I keep these tablets on me until I’m inspired to go back in and make the music. I never take a break from my pen, because I pride myself on that.

Facebook is really about communicating and telling stories… We think that people can really help spread awareness of organ donation and that they want to participate in this to their friends. And that can be a big part of helping solve the crisis that’s out there.

There was one incident at a movie theater where my girl got mad at these guys who were talking behind us. I never looked back there, but she was like, ‚Will you all just shut up!‘ And I just got up and moved three rows in front. She was like, ‚What are you doing?!‘ I was like, ‚You better get up here! I don’t play the fighting games.‘

Anger is wonderful. It keeps you going. I’m angry about bankers. About the government.

But when I hear a great song, I can’t help but be inspired by it, regardless of whatever genre that song falls under.

I just hope people don’t get sick of us. I’m sick of us and I’m in Destiny’s Child.

I never listen to ‚Nevermind.‘ I haven’t listened to it since we put it out. That says something.

Writing is challenging work because it’s so easy to get consumed with how it’s going, what’s going to happen to it, who’s going to like or not like it. You want to get all of that stuff out of your head and just let the work flow.

I don’t think there’s an option for me to fall in love slowly or at medium speed. I either do, or I don’t.

I used to stutter really badly. Everybody thinks it’s funny. And it’s not funny. It’s not.

One of the interesting things about having little musical knowledge is that you generate surprising results sometimes; you move to places you wouldn’t if you knew better.

Ten people who speak make more noise than ten thousand who are silent.