I need music. It’s like my heartbeat, so to speak. It keeps me going no matter what’s going on – bad games, press, whatever!

Music is always a commentary on society.

In a lot of ways, success is much harder than I thought it would be. I figured that you’d get here and then everything would be happily ever after. But, it’s hard work, almost harder once you’re successful because you’ve got to maintain it.

In all my work, in the movies I write, the lyrics, the poetry, the prose, the essays, I am saying that we may encounter many defeats – maybe it’s imperative that we encounter the defeats – but we are much stronger than we appear to be and maybe much better than we allow ourselves to be. Human beings are more alike than unalike.

I’m committed to the fight game.

Do the best you can, and don’t take life too serious.

A goal is not always meant to be reached, it often serves simply as something to aim at.

Treat failure as a lesson on how not to approach achieving a goal, and then use that learning to improve your chances of success when you try again. Failure is only the end if you decide to stop.

It took a lot of blood, sweat and tears to get to where we are today, but we have just begun. Today we begin in earnest the work of making sure that the world we leave our children is just a little bit better than the one we inhabit today.

Confidence is that feeling by which the mind embarks in great and honorable courses with a sure hope and trust in itself.

Well, I think we tried very hard not to be overconfident, because when you get overconfident, that’s when something snaps up and bites you.

I always have to be writing.

Every album, I make big records. I’m going to always make an anthem. That’s what I do.

As a songwriter, you respect and appreciate the writings of other people, and I often get asked, are there songs out there I wish I’d written? Yes. There’s many of them!

I want to thank The Beatles for almost single-handedly getting me out of writer’s block.

‚Nothin‘ on You‘ by B.o.B was the first song where I heard myself on the radio. I’d been trying my whole career to write a song like that, which incorporates live instruments with hip-hop and singing.

When I was performing the songs on ‚Kiss Land,‘ it was a great singalong. But there were moments where I realized some parts were catchier than the others. There’s maybe two choruses on all of ‚Kiss Land.‘

Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.

Nothing builds self-esteem and self-confidence like accomplishment.

Fill your bowl to the brim and it will spill. Keep sharpening your knife and it will blunt.

I’m just like you – I want to be a good human being. I’m doing my best, and I’m working at it. And I’m trying to be a Christian. I’m always amazed when people walk up to me and say, ‚I’m a Christian.‘ I always think, ‚Already? You’ve already got it?‘ I’m working at it. And at my age, I’ll still be working at it at 96.

Without football, my life is worth nothing.

All I ever wanted to do with my life was own a little house. I did that way back with ‚Rocky,‘ so now everything I do is just icing on the cake.

What makes a song last is real content from a mind that is thinking a little bit harder about certain things. A lot of artists don’t really think that hard.

We must not sit still and look for miracles; up and doing, and the Lord will be with thee. Prayer and pains, through faith in Christ Jesus, will do anything.

I play piano and ukulele, and I taught myself those things just because I wanted to play them.

That’s been one of my mantras – focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.

Your personal history is a part of what happens with your hands and your head as you play music.

The individual who can do something that the world wants done will, in the end, make his way regardless of his race.

Affirmation without discipline is the beginning of delusion.

I’m not the sort of person who gives up on things. The first time we crossed the Atlantic in the balloon, it crashed, and we went on and did the Pacific. First time we crossed the Atlantic in a boat, it sank, and we went on and got the record. So, generally speaking, we will pick ourselves up, brush ourselves down, and carry on.

My dad was like a stage mother he always pushed me to do what I wanted.

When a person starts to talk about their dreams, it’s as if something bubbles up from within. Their eyes brighten, their face glows, and you can feel the excitement in their words.

There is no doubt that life is given us, not to be enjoyed, but to be overcome; to be got over.

Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.

It is the set of the sails, not the direction of the wind that determines which way we will go.

No one is useless in this world who lightens the burden of it to anyone else.

Thinking is easy, acting is difficult, and to put one’s thoughts into action is the most difficult thing in the world.

I am not afraid of saying something and going and pursuing it. That’s it. I see it in my mind. I say it out loud. I go and do it.

It is only in his music, which Americans are able to admire because a protective sentimentality limits their understanding of it, that the Negro in America has been able to tell his story.

When nature has work to be done, she creates a genius to do it.

Music for me, it demands full concentration.

There’s poetry in being the band that can sell out Wembley but also makes a record in a garage. I don’t like doing what people expect me to do.

The reason that I’m here at all is because of my relationship with my family and their encouragement of me to be a musician and to work hard. As long as I stay there in that space, I can do anything. That’s my truth.

I still wanna rap better than everybody else, and I wanna say important things.

No matter what love throws at you, you have to believe in it.

Whoever is winning at the moment will always seem to be invincible.

Sitting on a bedroom floor crying is something that makes you feel really alone. If someone’s singing about that feeling, you feel bonded to that person. That’s the only way I can find an explanation for why 55,000 people would want to come see me sing.

Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.

If my businesses or my investments are not profitable, then I don’t eat. And I like to eat.

We are not animals. We are not a product of what has happened to us in our past. We have the power of choice.

I have always enjoyed watching my songs make people cry.

Hide not your talents. They for use were made. What’s a sundial in the shade?

In a budget, how important is art versus music versus athletics versus computer programming? At the end of the day, some of those trade-offs will be made politically.

I wanted to use my fame and this face that everyone knows so well to help uplift and inspire people around the world.

People who pity themselves think, ‚Why would I try to do anything? I’ll just fail.‘

It was always a plan that we were going to have a retail side with what were doing musically, like an Apple store or Nike Town. I wanted something where you can come get everything – ‚Marathon‘ or ‚All Money‘ or ‚Crenshaw‘ – and make it like an experience. Especially with what Crenshaw and Slauson meant to my story.

Life is too short not to celebrate nice moments!

Have you not learned that strength comes to an ordinary soul when given an extraordinary calling?

If people take anything from my music, it should be motivation to know that anything is possible as long as you keep working at it and don’t back down.

Of course it would be nice for everybody and myself if we could win but we can still have a personal or a team win if we achieve a target that is effectively a win for us.