I find rebellion packaged by a major corporation a little hard to take seriously.

I’m not really concerned with portraying this tough warrior – I mean, that’s part of my job and I take that very seriously. But I don’t have anything to hide, and I’m not concerned with what people think.

If the writing is honest it cannot be separated from the man who wrote it.

Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are.

This above all; to thine own self be true.

Sometimes we be playing the politics too much and forget who we are just to win.

I pay attention to lyrics and I know what rap fans care about. I try to write for the average listener and I’m conscious of the mainstream without selling out.

Only the ideas that we really live have any value.

Beauty and femininity are ageless and can’t be contrived, and glamour, although the manufacturers won’t like this, cannot be manufactured. Not real glamour; it’s based on femininity.

If you consider the definition of authenticity, it’s saying something and actually doing it. I write my own songs. I made my own videos. I pick my producers. Nothing goes out without my permission. It’s all authentic.

Ultimately, I’m not doing that much. I’m only doing what a human being who feels wants to do – in my way, without stepping out of my flow, while staying in my lane. Without, I guess, boring people.

I don’t believe in endorsing a product that you don’t want to endorse.

I would impress upon your minds the fact that if you want to do a man justice, you should believe what a man says himself rather than what people say he says.

The essential lesson I’ve learned in life is to just be yourself. Treasure the magnificent being that you are and recognize first and foremost you’re not here as a human being only. You’re a spiritual being having a human experience.

Yes, I’m still going to misbehave!

I’m giving all that I have in this life. I’m opening up my notebook, and I’m saying everything in there out loud.

All my big mistakes are when I try to second-guess or please an audience. My work is always stronger when I get very selfish about it.

I live halfway between reality and theater at all times. And I was born this way.

I’m not trying to be fashionable. Never was!

Why lie? I’m not going to be a hypocrite and say the opposite of what I think, like some others do.

At Sarah Lawrence, I realized that everybody was already what they were going to be. The painters were painting, the writers writing, the dancers dancing. And nobody wore any makeup. The art was uppermost.

Real life is the life that’s in you, not your circumstances, like where you live or what job you have or who you’re in relationship with.

It is very hard to not be able to engage with people in a real and honest way because they either want something from me, or they see me as something that I simply am not.

I never wanted to write the sort of song that said, ‚Look at how abnormal and crazy and out there I am, man!‘

One thing about me is I try to be honest.

Men seldom, or rather never for a length of time and deliberately, rebel against anything that does not deserve rebelling against.

All I can do is be me, whoever that is.

I want people to understand they have to live their own lives the way they want to and not just do what we do.

If you’re performing music that is not who you are or where you’re at, it is painful. It’s painful for the performer and for the audience.

I love that I can tell the truth and have people laugh at it.

Always be sincere, even if you don’t mean it.

I feel like the reason people feel like they know me is because I’m giving you myself in the music. There’s where the connection comes from; you can’t Twitter that.

Say there’s a white kid who lives in a nice home, goes to an all-white school, and is pretty much having everything handed to him on a platter – for him to pick up a rap tape is incredible to me, because what that’s saying is that he’s living a fantasy life of rebellion.

Everyone assumes I practise all of my own laws but I don’t. I think anybody who did would be a horrible ugly person to be around.

You are only afraid if you are not in harmony with yourself. People are afraid because they have never owned up to themselves.

I hate the giving of the hand unless the whole man accompanies it.

To me, business isn’t about wearing suits or pleasing stockholders. It’s about being true to yourself, your ideas and focusing on the essentials.

Who I am on stage is very, very different to who I am in real life.

I’m not really good at fun-to-know, human interest stuff. We’re not ‚celebrities‘, whose life itself is a performance. Good or bad or ugly, we are our words. They’re what people meet.

My definition of country music is really pretty simple. It’s when someone sings about their life and what they know, from an authentic place.

Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is the truth.

Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.

Life is not living in the suburbs with a white picket fence. That’s not life. Somehow our American culture has made it out that that’s what life needs to be – and that if it’s not that, it’s all screwed up. It’s not.

I like to be myself, and I don’t pretend. For instance, I don’t dress up for occasions; I am what I am.

I don’t want to be fake. I’m just being me. And I have the power to break stereotypes and whatever useless rules that society puts on us.

One of my big goals as a human being is to continue to write what’s really happening to me, even if it’s a tough pill to swallow for people around me… I do fear that if I ever were to have someone in my life who mattered, I would second-guess every one of my lyrics.

I’d rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not.

I think that I do feel that my nature is to express what this self, this particular self at this time, experiences in the world. And that is so organic – I use this metaphor a lot but I’ll use it again – it’s like a pine tree producing pine cones, or a blackberry bush producing blackberries – it’s just what happens with this being, now.

I want to grow old without facelifts. I want to have the courage to be loyal to the face I have made.

Jesus lived a life that was full of joy and contradictions and fights, you know? If they were to paint a picture of Jesus without contradictions, the gospels would be fake, but the contradictions are a sign of authenticity.

When you are content to be simply yourself and don’t compare or compete, everybody will respect you.

There’s just some magic in truth and honesty and openness.

If you want to get each individual’s honest opinion, you don’t want that opinion to be influenced by others who are present, much less allow a group to coordinate what they are going to say.

I do believe in God. But you won’t find me visiting temples every now and then. I believe in self-realization. Peace of mind matters a lot to me. What’s the point in doing something just for the sake of it? I’d rather do something I like doing as long as I’m being true to myself.

Sincere words are not fine; fine words are not sincere.

My life is real.

Live-tweeting your bikini wax is not vulnerability. Nor is posting a blow-by-blow of your divorce . That’s an attempt to hot-wire connection. But you can’t cheat real connection. It’s built up slowly. It’s about trust and time.

Man is the only creature that refuses to be what he is.

In everything truth surpasses the imitation and copy.

I meant what I said and I said what I meant.

The truth is, I’ve never fooled anyone. I’ve let men sometimes fool themselves.