A shady business never yields a sunny life.

I find hope in the darkest of days, and focus in the brightest. I do not judge the universe.

I’ve always kinda been a little outcast myself, a little oddball, doin‘ my thing, my own way. And it’s been hard for me to, to be accepted, certainly in the early years of my life.

We all have experiences in our lives that change us, and we all learn from people, like my dad, but at the end of the day, it’s only us. And we’re only responsible to make ourselves happy.

Wisdom allows nothing to be good that will not be so forever; no man to be happy but he that needs no other happiness than what he has within himself; no man to be great or powerful that is not master of himself.

The truth is something that burns. It burns off dead wood. And people don’t like having the dead wood burnt off, often because they’re 95 percent dead wood.

One thing I want to make clear, as far as my own rebirth is concerned, the final authority is myself and no one else, and obviously not China’s Communists.

I’m one of the world’s most self-conscious people. I really have to struggle.

Because forgiveness is like this: a room can be dank because you have closed the windows, you’ve closed the curtains. But the sun is shining outside, and the air is fresh outside. In order to get that fresh air, you have to get up and open the window and draw the curtains apart.

A great part of courage is the courage of having done the thing before.

Try to be a rainbow in someone’s cloud.

I believe that a trusting attitude and a patient attitude go hand in hand. You see, when you let go and learn to trust God, it releases joy in your life. And when you trust God, you’re able to be more patient. Patience is not just about waiting for something… it’s about how you wait, or your attitude while waiting.

To live without Hope is to Cease to live.

We know what we are, but know not what we may be.

I’ve done a lot of things I’m not proud of, such as getting my girlfriend pregnant when I was 23 and the way I handled that.

If you have an enemy, then learn and know your enemy, don’t just be mad at him or her.

I woke up one day and thought: ‚I want to write a book about the history of my body.‘ I could justify talking about my mother because it was in her body that my body began.

Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it’s always your choice.

I’m convinced of this: Good done anywhere is good done everywhere. For a change, start by speaking to people rather than walking by them like they’re stones that don’t matter. As long as you’re breathing, it’s never too late to do some good.

Never, and I mean never, allow anyone else’s ideas of who you can or can’t become sully your dream or pollute your imagination. This is your territory, and a ‚Keep Out‘ sign is a great thing to erect at all entrances to your imagination.

I think that somehow, we learn who we really are and then live with that decision.

I cry so much less than I used to. I used to be one of the most teary people.

Beauty is everywhere a welcome guest.

Everything is an open book. I don’t speak on other people’s hardship, but if it happened in my life or something that has been an experience on my particular journey, I’m going to talk about it. That’s what my fan base appreciates the most. I’m universal. You can relate to the things I say or that I go through.

Oh, God, I struggle with low self-esteem all the time! I think everyone does. I have so much wrong with me, it’s unbelievable!

The worst men often give the best advice.

I may be no better, but at least I am different.

In 7th grade, I believe, I wrote my first rap song. It was about everything I was seeing, everything that was going on around me.

If you hold a cat by the tail you learn things you cannot learn any other way.

I can live for two months on a good compliment.

I have spent many years of my life in opposition, and I rather like the role.

People are looking for something a little more stable; people are feeling like they need to get closer to God.

When you hear people making hateful comments, stand up to them. Point out what a waste it is to hate, and you could open their eyes.

People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.

How does a nice Catholic girl end up going to prison for a year? It’s crazy. I’ve made mistakes. I have to pay for those mistakes.

It is well for the world that in most of us, by the age of thirty, the character has set like plaster, and will never soften again.

A lot of people like to do certain things, but they’re not that good at it. Keep going through the things that you like to do, until you find something that you actually seem to be extremely good at. It can be anything.

Just as your car runs more smoothly and requires less energy to go faster and farther when the wheels are in perfect alignment, you perform better when your thoughts, feelings, emotions, goals, and values are in balance.

Get busy living, or get busy dying.

Man needs his difficulties because they are necessary to enjoy success.

If you live only in one culture for the first 20 years of your life, you become conditioned without knowing it.

I would love to continue in music, with writing… but I am not the kind of person who will hang around if I start to become irrelevant. If that happens, I will bow down gracefully, raise my kids, and have a garden. And I am going to let my hair go gray when I am older. I don’t need to be blonde when I’m 60!

The world can criticize me, but l can always criticize it back.

If you look at my life, generally, I’ve been put in situations which were difficult and which I conquered.

Teach me to feel another’s woe, to hide the fault I see, that mercy I to others show, that mercy show to me.

I’m all about evolution. I’m the first person to judge myself.

My family, frankly, they weren’t folks who went to church every week. My mother was one of the most spiritual people I knew but she didn’t raise me in the church, so I came to my Christian faith later in life and it was because the precepts of Jesus Christ spoke to me in terms of the kind of life that I would want to lead.

The day you stop doing the small things is the day you think you’re above everybody else.

There are no second acts in American lives.

As a matter of self-preservation, a man needs good friends or ardent enemies, for the former instruct him and the latter take him to task.

Pessimism leads to weakness, optimism to power.

A well adjusted person is one who makes the same mistake twice without getting nervous.

Keep a good attitude and do the right thing even when it’s hard. When you do that you are passing the test. And God promises you your marked moments are on their way.

If you would lift me up you must be on higher ground.

I feel confident imposing change on myself. It’s a lot more fun progressing than looking back. That’s why I need to throw curve balls.

If we are to be happy, we must first react against our tendency to follow the line of least resistance, a tendency that causes us either to remain as we are, or to look primarily to activities external to ourselves for what will provide new impetus to our lives.

It’s normal for human beings to identify with their own separate self. The problem is that we get caught in that notion of ourself as a separate individual and caught in that individual self’s agenda.

When you focus on being a blessing, God makes sure that you are always blessed in abundance.

I say, beware of all enterprises that require new clothes, and not rather a new wearer of clothes.

I grew up in a funny way.

I’ve learned a lot since I was a new mother. My approach to struggle and shame now is to talk to yourself like you’d talk to someone you love and reach out to tell your story.