I didn’t have any children of my own.

A man should never neglect his family for business.

You have to be very rich or very poor to live without a trade.

Music is part of the life of fashion, too.

My elder brothers were all put apprentices to different trades. I was put to the grammar-school at eight years of age, my father intending to devote me, as the tithe of his sons, to the service of the Church.

Family and friendships are two of the greatest facilitators of happiness.

Marriage is a school itself. Also, having children. Becoming a father changed my whole life. It taught me as if by revelation.

The CIA is made up of boys whose families sent them to Princeton but wouldn’t let them into the family brokerage business.

I’m generous. I give good tips. It’s just – the way I live my life, ironically enough, is: I don’t want anything. I’m not a consumer. I don’t crave objects.

Sometimes, when I see my granddaughters make small discoveries of their own, I wish I were a child.

Leave all the afternoon for exercise and recreation, which are as necessary as reading. I will rather say more necessary because health is worth more than learning.

Fame is like caviar, you know – it’s good to have caviar but not when you have it at every meal.

You don’t have to turn on the TV set. You don’t have to work on the Internet. It’s up to you.

My family has very strong women. My mother never laughed at my dream of Africa, even though everyone else did because we didn’t have any money, because Africa was the ‚dark continent‘, and because I was a girl.

I think the thing we see is that as people are using video games more, they tend to watch passive TV a bit less. And so using the PC for the Internet, playing video games, is starting to cut into the rather unbelievable amount of time people spend watching TV.

We have to rediscover the eternal values and then live them out.

I listen to my mother, and that keeps me out of trouble. I’m a good son.

I’d like to think that I’m a calm and sweet person. I tend to be very playful at home with my children, but in life… we have to fight our battles – our work battles, our political battles, our personal battles – and we’re focused.

My rule of life prescribed as an absolutely sacred rite smoking cigars and also the drinking of alcohol before, after and if need be during all meals and in the intervals between them.

I’m very much a creature of habit.

I get so excited when a song I wrote that’s very personal to me goes No. 1 and I look down and see people singing the words back to me.

Part of our tradition as black women is that we are universalists. Black children, yellow children, red children, brown children, that is the black woman’s normal, day-to-day relationship. In my family alone, we are about four different colors.

Exercise is bunk. If you are healthy, you don’t need it: if you are sick you should not take it.

I’ve been through natural disasters. I lived down in Miami and was down there for Hurricane Andrew which was a Category 5. There were members of my family that thought they were going to die. Everyone was in the bathtub.

That’s the most terrible thing about being an author – standing there at your mother’s funeral, but you don’t switch the author off. So your own innermost thoughts are grist for the mill. Who was it said – one of the famous lady novelists – ‚unhappy is the family that contains an author‘?

God’s dream is that you and I and all of us will realize that we are family, that we are made for togetherness, for goodness, and for compassion.

I’m just a friendly person; that runs in my family.

I’ve got incredible support from my wife and family and people around me. I’ve got great people around me who handle anything on the outside, business-wise, who help free me up to create in my job.

I take my kids to school. And if I go to work, I go to work, and they visit me on set. I come home. I have dinner with my family. I have breakfast with my family. I have a very solid, very warm home.

An armchair Jungian would say the whole thing is about my own ongoing spiritual search. My interior life has always been one of trying to find a spiritual link, maybe because I’m from a family of separate religious philosophies: Protestant and Catholic.

The shoe that fits one person pinches another; there is no recipe for living that suits all cases.

The African is my brother but he is my younger brother by several centuries.

If I were a woman, I would love to have lots of kids. But for men, I don’t believe in it.

My parents were divorced by the time I was even conscious – like, I don’t remember them ever being together.

Any man who doesn’t love his mama can’t be no friend of mine.

My chances of developing breast cancer have dropped from 87 percent to under 5 percent. I can tell my children that they don’t need to fear they will lose me to breast cancer.

My mom cleaned toilets for a long time, and she’d seen a lot of terrible things, but she was still the strength of our family. And there are women like that all across the country – all around the world – who show that type of fortitude.

If your mom cries a lot, you probably cry a lot. It’s what you learn.

Water is my drink.

I drive way too fast to worry about cholesterol.

Going home helps the content.

I have to tell you, my seven-year-old granddaughter said to my daughter, her mother, ‚So what’s the big deal about Grandma Maddy having been Secretary of State? Only girls are Secretaries of State.‘ Most of her lifetime, it’s true. But at the time it really was a big deal.

I was brought up as an only child, and we were very close. But when I was 14, we got evicted. We came home to a padlock, and I looked up at my mom and she was crying, and there was nothing to do.

My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

My family wasn’t rich, so when it comes to money, I tend to think, ‚Err on the side of caution.‘

I wonder how many decisions we make every day. I believe it’s probably hundreds. We decide whether or not to get out of bed, what we’ll eat, what we’ll do, what we’ll think about, what we’ll say… and on and on.

Every man’s reputation proceeds from those of his own household.

If you have a family mission statement that clarifies what your purpose is, then you use that as the criterion by which you make the decisions.

That summer after the draft was probably the most fun I’ve ever had, because all I had to do every day was wake up and go work out for four or five hours. I got to play some golf, which I love to do, too, and then got to hang out with my family.

Christianity is a lifestyle. And being a Christian is more than a label.

There is no such thing as fun for the whole family.

He didn’t come out of my belly, but my God, I’ve made his bones, because I’ve attended to every meal, and how he sleeps, and the fact that he swims like a fish because I took him to the ocean. I’m so proud of all those things. But he is my biggest pride.

The death of my father is probably the biggest thing that I ever faced. Daddy and I were best friends.

Children sweeten labours, but they make misfortunes more bitter.

All my stepchildren carried the burden of my fame. Sometimes they would read terrible things about me, and I’d worry about whether it would hurt them. I would tell them: ‚Don’t hide these things from me. I’d rather you ask me these things straight out, and I’ll answer all your questions.‘

My grandpa was a preacher.

The people you choose to have around you make all the difference. My family and close friends keep me grounded. You have to have a mind of your own and a strong head on your shoulders. Cricket is the most important thing to me, so the rest of it pales in comparison.

Never get out of bed before noon.

Before finding music, I didn’t have too many aspirations. I wanted to hang out, make a little money from whatever I had to do.

Clearly this is a tough economic time, and a lot of families are hurting. So when we talk to parents, we talk about small changes for kids and things that don’t cost extra money. Like adding water and eliminating sugary drinks and sodas. That’s going to save money right there. Or adding a few more vegetables.

Give a little love to a child, and you get a great deal back.