If I make a fool of myself, who cares? I’m not frightened by anyone’s perception of me.

If what you did yesterday seems big, you haven’t done anything today.

I have no time to think about other writers. I am too busy with my own problems.

It’s not an easy course. It’s not designed to be. We’re not here to get you in touch with your inner child.

I’ve been called a recluse. There’s definitely truth in that. I like to spend time alone.

It’s much worse to read criticism about your son than yourself.

I have to keep improving myself and challenging myself.

When I was writing ‚Kitchen Confidential,‘ I was in my 40s, I had never paid rent on time, I was 10 years behind on my taxes, I had never owned my own furniture or a car.

Don’t ever play yourself.

I know I’m a good professional, I know that no one’s harder on me than myself and that’s never going to change, under any circumstances.

I leave the genre labeling to other people. I really do. If I were to think too hard about it, that would stifle you creatively. If you think too hard about who other people want you to be as an artist, it stops you from being who you want to be as an artist.

Those of us who submitted or surrendered our ideas and dreams and identities to the ‚leaders‘ must take back our rights, our identities, our responsibilities.

One of the greatest lessons of my own life was learning to turn the inner rampage of hatred and anger toward my own father for his reprehensible behavior and abandonment of his family into an inner reaction more closely aligned with God and God-realized love.

Well, I don’t think there’s any need for people to focus on my career.

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.

A song is anything that can walk by itself.

You may be always victorious if you will never enter into any contest where the issue does not wholly depend upon yourself.

You cannot be lonely if you like the person you’re alone with.

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.

I talk about myself in the third person all the time. I don’t live my life in the way someone like you does. I live my life completely serving only my work and my fans.

Few women, I fear, have had such reason as I have to think the long sad years of youth were worth living for the sake of middle age.

You can tell more about a person by what he says about others than you can by what others say about him.

Really, the only thing that makes sense is to strive for greater collective enlightenment.

Be not a slave of words.

I don’t see the point of doing an interview unless you’re going to share the things you learn in life and the mistakes you make. So to admit that I’m extremely human and have done some dark things I don’t think makes me unusual or unusually dark. I think it actually is the right thing to do, and I’d like to think it’s the nice thing to do.

If you don’t know your full-throttle history, the whole story of how you came to where you are, it’s kind of hard to put things together.

Whenever I’m around some who is modest, I think, ‚Run like hell and all of fire.‘ You don’t want modesty, you want humility.

Has this world been so kind to you that you should leave with regret? There are better things ahead than any we leave behind.

We should not underestimate ourselves, because if lots of individuals go together then we can accomplish almost anything.

The giving of love is an education in itself.

Take a course in good water and air; and in the eternal youth of Nature you may renew your own. Go quietly, alone; no harm will befall you.

I’ve never written a song in my life. It’s all a big hoax.

Your success and happiness lies in you. Resolve to keep happy, and your joy and you shall form an invincible host against difficulties.

A lot of times, people feel that if they forgive the person who hurt them, then they will continue to take advantage of them or not take responsibility for what they did wrong.

In retrospect, I can see I couldn’t talk to people face to face, so I got on stage and started screaming and squealing and twitching about. Ha! Like, that sure made sense!

We write for the same reason that we walk, talk, climb mountains or swim the oceans – because we can. We have some impulse within us that makes us want to explain ourselves to other human beings. That’s why we paint, that’s why we dare to love someone – because we have the impulse to explain who we are.

You’re going to go through tough times – that’s life. But I say, ‚Nothing happens to you, it happens for you.‘ See the positive in negative events.

I worked with someone who told me they’d never like me. But for some reason, I just felt like I needed her approval. So I started changing myself to please her. It made me stop being social and friendly. I was so unhappy.

I don’t think I’m such an amazing person who needs to be written about.

There is a tendency for things to right themselves.

Glam really did plant seeds for a new identity. I think a lot of kids needed that – that sense of reinvention. Kids learned that however crazy you may think it is, there is a place for what you want to do and who you want to be.

When you come to see a picture of mine, I want you to know that I’m not going to do anything that will make you uncomfortable. I want you to know that you won’t be disappointed in me.

Many people, especially young people, would like to be more independent and on their own. But it is very difficult and they suffer from feelings of isolation. I think that is one reason why young readers support my work.

When I wake up in the morning, I feel just like any other insecure 24-year-old girl.

Our passions are like convulsion fits, which, though they make us stronger for a time, leave us the weaker ever after.

Let go of yesterday.

Secretly we’re all a little more absurd than we make ourselves out to be.

We’re all capable of mistakes, but I do not care to enlighten you on the mistakes we may or may not have made.

Showing off is the fool’s idea of glory.

I’m a can-do girl.

Some people can just let things go, but I can’t, especially if there’s something that worries me or makes me sad.

Complaining is dangerous business. It can damage or even destroy your relationship with God, your relationships with other people, and even with your relationship with yourself.

A guilty conscience needs to confess. A work of art is a confession.

I am getting to the point where the only love worth being in is the love worth singing about.

I am just one human being.

If there is only one thing in my life that I am proud of, it’s that I’ve never been a kept woman.

With all singers, insecurity is your best security. That’s why we’re such loud people and why we walk all funny. You think, ‚Are people interested?‘ But I think our band has something and they know we don’t just put albums out. We do think about it.

I’ve learned that men and women who are living wholehearted lives really allow themselves to soften into joy and happiness. They allow themselves to experience it.

Prison was the best thing that ever happened to me.

I’m not a big fan of psychoanalysis: I think if you have mental problems what you need are good pills. But I do think that if you have thinks that bother you, things that are unresolved, the more that you talk about them, write about them, the less serious they become.

I feel like people can relate to me because we all go through wins and roadblocks and passion and pain, and it’s a vibe.