I’m on the autism spectrum. I don’t usually follow social coding and so therefore I go my own way.

I’ve never thought about songwriting as a weapon. I’ve only thought about it as a way to help me get through love and loss and sadness and loneliness and growing up.

There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

I write for myself things that I’ve gone through.

I use a stream-of-consciousness approach; if you don’t censor yourself, you end up with what you’re most concerned about, but you haven’t filtered it through your conscious mind. Then you craft it.

All I can do is be me, whoever that is.

When I arrived, at first a lot of people were like, ‚This kid is different.‘

People always say when they meet me that I’m not what they expect. I assume they think I’m this super dark and depressing guy, but I like to channel all of those emotions into my work.

In bourgeois society capital is independent and has individuality, while the living person is dependent and has no individuality.

I just have a thing in my brain that when I’m about to do something that’s genuine or authentic, I think of it in song form. I’ll be like, ‚Yo, this is a human emotion that no one talks about.‘

Her body calculated to a millimeter to suggest a bud yet guarantee a flower.

I don’t have to be what you want me to be.

Creation is a sustained period of bliss, even though the subject can still be very sad. Because there’s the triumph of coming through and understanding that you have, and that you did it the way only you could do it. You didn’t do it the way somebody told you to do it.

It’s kind of like a challenge to myself to be able to hear somebody else’s hook and kind of interpret the words. Because my own hooks, I already know what I mean when I write them.

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.

The bottom line is that everyone thinks differently.

Always recognize that human individuals are ends, and do not use them as means to your end.

I love being a woman and I was not one of these women who rose through professional life by wearing men’s clothes or looking masculine. I loved wearing bright colors and being who I am.

I’ve always felt quite singular, even as a child. That I must stay on track to keep my purpose.

I think there is a little magic in the fact that I’m so totally real but look so artificial at the same time.

The question isn’t, ‚What do we want to know about people?‘, It’s, ‚What do people want to tell about themselves?‘

I do have tatoos, and I do wear leather, but there are other sides of me, that my film express.

If you’re performing music that is not who you are or where you’re at, it is painful. It’s painful for the performer and for the audience.

I’ve never been one to sit back and go, ‚I’d better do what the audience wants me to do, because I don’t want to lose them.‘

We allow our ignorance to prevail upon us and make us think we can survive alone, alone in patches, alone in groups, alone in races, even alone in genders.

Robyn is who I am. Rihanna – that’s an idea of who I am.

A person standing in front of an audience without enthusiasm for his subject and his actions is disconnected from his spirit.

Key is never be afraid of being yourself. Never!

You pay a certain penalty for going your own way. A lot of people think you’re nuts, and you’re not as popular with girls as you should be.

I’ve always been very liberal when it comes to people thinking for themselves.

Singing aloud leaves you with a sense of levity and contentedness.

The poor are discussed as this homogeneous mash, like porridge. The idea that they might be individuals, and be where they are for very different, diverse reasons, again seems to escape some people.

I feel like the reason people feel like they know me is because I’m giving you myself in the music. There’s where the connection comes from; you can’t Twitter that.

I find only freedom in the realms of eccentricity.

Originality is a thing we constantly clamour for, and constantly quarrel with.

My style has always been my own, just like my flow and style.

When I got somethin‘ to say, I’ll say it.

I like to be in control of how I look and how I feel and how I act.

It was very lucky for me as a writer that I studied the physical sciences rather than English. I wrote for my own amusement. There was no kindly English professor to tell me for my own good how awful my writing really was. And there was no professor with the power to order me what to read, either.

In my father’s generation, the product was 80 percent of what you were putting into the world, and your personal life was 20 percent. It now seems that 80 percent of the product I put out is silly, made-up stories and what I’m wearing.

I try never to wear my own clothes, I pretend I’m someone else.

I believe in believing. My coach John Kavanagh is a big atheist, and he is always trying to persuade people to his way of thinking, and I think, ‚What a waste of energy.‘ If people want to believe in this god or that god, that’s fine by me; believe away. But I think we can be our own gods. I believe in myself.

We all want to be famous people, and the moment we want to be something we are no longer free.

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

I think style is being so comfortable and confident in what you’re wearing. That’s what style is, ‚cause everybody’s got different style.

It is through art, and through art only, that we can realise our perfection.

I do have a few little tattoos, but they were mostly done to cover scars because I’m so fair.

In this big ball of people, I’m just one grain of sand on this beach.

My whole life is a theater piece.

All of my music is honest.

Almost everybody will listen to you when you tell your own story.

Everyone should be respected as an individual, but no one idolized.

Taste is the only morality. Tell me what you like and I’ll tell you what you are.

I want to look my best for God. So many people have the attitude that if you’re a Christian you’ve got to dress bad, wear an old color, not do anything to your hair, have nothing. It’s no wonder that Christianity is not very attractive. I mean, how many people do you know in a Western culture that’s going to go, ‚Yeah, give me some of that?‘

I had to prove you could be a new kind of black man. I had to show the world.

I always try to be myself. Ever since I was an introverted kid, I’d get on stage and be able to break out of my shell.

Individuality is founded in feeling; and the recesses of feeling, the darker, blinder strata of character, are the only places in the world in which we catch real fact in the making, and directly perceive how events happen, and how work is actually done.

You know, I just do whatever feels right to me! And so that’s what you’re gonna get!

At first, I was scared to show fear because you can never be sure how people will perceive you. But I dared myself to do that, to stand out. Now I’ll talk about being beaten up or robbed or making a stupid decision because of a girl or whatever.

If I could write directly on a typewriter or a computer, I would do it. But keyboards have always intimidated me. I’ve never been able to think clearly with my fingers in that position. A pen is a much more primitive instrument. You feel that the words are coming out of your body and then you dig the words into the page.

An artist or a creative person of any kind goes about their work because it’s their path, it’s what excites them, it’s what aligns their soul with who they truly are, who they showed up to be.