I didn’t try to copy my dad or fit into the pressure or the mold that everybody tried to make me fit into.

What my character is or how many jails I have lounged in, or wards or walls or wassails, how many lonely-heart poetry readings I have dodged, is beside the point. A man’s soul or lack of it will be evident with what he can carve upon a white sheet of paper.

Every time you think the problem is ‚out there,‘ that very thought is the problem.

The thing to do, it seems to me, is to prepare yourself so you can be a rainbow in somebody else’s cloud. Somebody who may not look like you. May not call God the same name you call God – if they call God at all. I may not dance your dances or speak your language. But be a blessing to somebody. That’s what I think.

I am, as a character, at times, a little overbearing. I recognize that.

Virtue she finds too painful an endeavour, content to dwell in decencies for ever.

I have learned to know God. I have recast my social belief… All my admirers are married; most of my friends are dead; and I stand with all the world before me, where to choose a path to make in it.

Do the thing you fear most and the death of fear is certain.

It never mattered to me that people in school didn’t think that country music was cool, and they made fun of me for it – though it did matter to me that I was not wearing the clothes that everybody was wearing at that moment. But at some point, I was just like, ‚I like wearing sundresses and cowboy boots.‘

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

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

I couldn’t go to college, so I went to the library three days a week for 10 years.

Conflict cannot survive without your participation.

They must often change, who would be constant in happiness or wisdom.

Let everyone try and find that as a result of daily prayer he adds something new to his life, something with which nothing can be compared.

Self-pity in its early stage is as snug as a feather mattress. Only when it hardens does it become uncomfortable.

I’m very proud to be black, but black is not all I am. That’s my cultural historical background, my genetic makeup, but it’s not all of who I am nor is it the basis from which I answer every question.

If you begin to understand what you are without trying to change it, then what you are undergoes a transformation.

I do believe in the old saying, ‚What does not kill you makes you stronger.‘ Our experiences, good and bad, make us who we are. By overcoming difficulties, we gain strength and maturity.

Do you want to know who you are? Don’t ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.

Hip-hop is ever changing but you’ll always have the pack. And you’ll always have those people who are separated from the pack.

I don’t see myself in terms of artifice. I see myself as a real person who chooses to live my life in an open way – artistically.

Eat to please thyself, but dress to please others.

Take the complications, rules, shoulds, musts, have tos, and so on out of your life. By uncomplicating your life and removing the trivial pursuits that occupy so much of it, you open a channel for the genius within you to emerge.

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

Freedom makes a huge requirement of every human being. With freedom comes responsibility. For the person who is unwilling to grow up, the person who does not want to carry his own weight, this is a frightening prospect.

I think I have always had a little humor.

There’s a victory, and defeat; the first and best of victories, the lowest and worst of defeats which each man gains or sustains at the hands not of another, but of himself.

It’s hard to practice compassion when we’re struggling with our authenticity or when our own worthiness is off-balance.

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.

Use your health, even to the point of wearing it out. That is what it is for. Spend all you have before you die; do not outlive yourself.

Character is determined more by the lack of certain experiences than by those one has had.

I have resolved on an enterprise that has no precedent and will have no imitator. I want to set before my fellow human beings a man in every way true to nature; and that man will be myself.

It is a fact that cannot be denied: the wickedness of others becomes our own wickedness because it kindles something evil in our own hearts.

The most challenging project I’ve ever done, I think, is every single thing I’ve ever tried to do. It’s never easy.

All my life I’ve been taught how to die, but no one ever taught me how to grow old.

I’ve had no contact with my daughter for years. That’s her choice. Anyway, you move on. If people don’t want to bother with me, fine. You know, God bless them, and move on.

Never pretend to a love which you do not actually feel, for love is not ours to command.

I like to be creative.

To add value to others, one must first value others.

Some of the kids in school used to call my father a fake or a phony. That kind of thing brought on a few fights.

Nobody can bring you peace but yourself.

I kinda live where I find myself.

This is certain, that a man that studieth revenge keeps his wounds green, which otherwise would heal and do well.

When I write, it’s like choosing which shoes I’m going to put on. More often than not, my lyrics are personal – but I sometimes have to put myself in other people’s shoes.

Friendship with ones self is all important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else in the world.

I don’t want to make money, I just want to be wonderful.

When I left the University of Notre Dame, I honestly felt I would never coach again.

I wish I could shut up, but I can’t, and I won’t.

I think I’m like most people – we fear the unknown and the things that have yet to come to pass, which are the very things that don’t deserve to be feared. When you give God complete control, it’s very hard not to be fearless.

At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person. Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us.

I suppose my best attribute, if you want to call it that, is sincerity. I can sell sincerity because that’s the way I am.

One mustn’t close one’s eyes to difficulty and to shortcomings; the more one recognizes them, the less they upset one.

I used to pray that God would make me a great athlete, and He never did.

If every choice you make comes from an honest place, you’re solid, and nothing anybody can say about you can rock you or change your opinion.

You can’t have it all, all at once. Who – man or woman – has it all, all at once? Over my lifespan, I think I have had it all. But in different periods of time, things were rough. And if you have a caring life partner, you help the other person when that person needs it.

What is a fear of living? It’s being preeminently afraid of dying. It is not doing what you came here to do, out of timidity and spinelessness. The antidote is to take full responsibility for yourself – for the time you take up and the space you occupy. If you don’t know what you’re here to do, then just do some good.

Transforming yourself into a deep listener will not only prove more amusing as you open your mind to their mind, but you will gain the most invaluable lessons about human psychology.

Some days I totally appreciate everything that’s happening to me, and some days I feel everyone’s waiting for me to mess up.

Songs are my diaries; they always have been. You have to put your trust in everyone because putting down those real, personal details and thoughts that make a song authentic also opens you right up. I am constantly misunderstood; a lot of people just don’t get me.

It’s stasis that kills you off in the end, not ambition.