authenticity quotes

I am who I am. That’s why my friends and peers respect and appreciate me. I don’t change or cater my actions to fit my surroundings. I’m myself 24/7. People appreciate that.

I always have been an activist for things that were just authentically a part of my life, that I felt connected to.

I wanted to only create a great perfume, not any perfume that would sell, but a great artistic one that the fans would not feel cheated by.

It could be if I fight in front of one person or one million people. It’s still the same emotions.

My definition of country music is really pretty simple. It’s when someone sings about their life and what they know, from an authentic place.

I feel like I have a job to do, like I constantly have to reinvent myself. The more I up the ante for myself, the better it is in the long run. I try to interact with my fans as much as possible. It’s good that the person I’m being onstage isn’t really an act. It’s really me.

I don’t like it when people who are young act like they’re 40. That’s taking too much on. Putting up a shield and trying to act like you’re so mature or whatever – I don’t try to act mature. Some people might say I’m mature for my age, but it’s not something I’m trying to do, you know? I’m just me.

I’m not trying to be fashionable. Never was!

My fans don’t feel like I hold anything back from them. They know whatever I’m going through now, they’ll hear about it on a record someday. They’ll hear the real story. There’s a little bit of lag time. It’s not as instant as going on a gossip blog. But it’s much more accurate.

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.

If you want to get each individual’s honest opinion, you don’t want that opinion to be influenced by others who are present, much less allow a group to coordinate what they are going to say.

Whether I’m wearing lots of makeup or no makeup, I’m always the same person inside.

People make suggestions on what to say all the time. I’ll give you an example; I don’t read what’s handed to me. People say, ‚Here, here’s your speech, or here’s an idea for a speech.‘ They’re changed. Trust me.

I would be a liar, a hypocrite, or a fool – and I’m not any of those – to say that I don’t write for the reader. I do. But for the reader who hears, who really will work at it, going behind what I seem to say. So I write for myself and that reader who will pay the dues.

I don’t know that you can put a label on growth. I’m just me.

Truth has rough flavours if we bite it through.

Everything is an open book. I don’t speak on other people’s hardship, but if it happened in my life or something that has been an experience on my particular journey, I’m going to talk about it. That’s what my fan base appreciates the most. I’m universal. You can relate to the things I say or that I go through.

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

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

Speak the truth, and all things alive or brute are vouchers, and the very roots of the grass underground there, do seem to stir and move to bear you witness.

I never do anything that I don’t want to do.

I don’t believe in doing things to manufacture my body to appeal to what I think people might like.

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.

If you only believe that you’re an artist when you have a big advance in your pocket and a single coming out, I would say that’s quite soulless. You have to have a sense of your own greatness and your own ability from a very deep place inside you. I am the one with the litmus test in my hands of what people need to hear next.

I’ve always been – you know, my personality is motivating and encouraging. And so I’m just being who God made me to be.

If you’re trying too hard to be the girl next door, you’re not going to be.

My parents were the same in the pulpit as they were at home. I think that’s where a lot of preachers‘ kids get off base sometimes. Because they don’t see the same things at both places.

Truth is handsomer than the affectation of love. Your goodness must have some edge to it, else it is none.

I try to not focus on what people expect from me.

I have never used Auto-Tune in a live television performance, and I have never used Auto-Tune in any of my concerts. That is a promise.

All I can do is try to create my own brand and have people appreciate me for that.

I don’t make people bend over backwards, and I don’t like that in people. I am definitely no diva.

I don’t believe in endorsing a product that you don’t want to endorse.

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

It’s easier to aim to please and say what others want to hear than to form an opinion and fight for it, even if it means taking a risk or losing your job.

I love that I can tell the truth and have people laugh at it.

There’s a gap between what I want to do, what I do on camera, and what gets edited. Right? So the goal is to try and close the gaps. What’s the biggest compliment is if I read a review and it’s exactly what I wrote down in my diary before ever filming it. That’s really cool. That’s the biggest signifier of closing the gaps.

One of my big goals as a human being is to continue to write what’s really happening to me, even if it’s a tough pill to swallow for people around me… I do fear that if I ever were to have someone in my life who mattered, I would second-guess every one of my lyrics.

I will never say something I don’t agree with or believe in… even if the reward is massive!

Use what language you will, you can never say anything but what you are.

The snow goose need not bathe to make itself white. Neither need you do anything but be yourself.

God hath given you one face, and you make yourselves another.

I think country music is popular – has been popular and will always be popular because I think a lot of real people singing about a lot of real stuff about real people. And it’s simple enough for people to understand it. And we kind of roll with the punches.

I just don’t feel like I have to explain myself.

There’s just some magic in truth and honesty and openness.

I had a lot of resistance, and not just to fame. I was always conscious of not changing.

I never wanted to look pretty on stage and sing about something we’ve all heard about before.

I’ve sat in sushi bars, really fine ones, and I know how hard this guy worked, how proud he is. I know you don’t need sauce. I know he doesn’t even want you to pour sauce. And I’ve seen customers come in and do that, and I’ve seen him, as stoic as he tries to remain, I’ve seen him die a little inside.

Let us begin by committing ourselves to the truth to see it like it is, and tell it like it is, to find the truth, to speak the truth, and to live the truth.

I’m not a star. I don’t feel I’m so great. So how can I make you feel great just because you’ve got my signature on a piece of paper?

One of my proudest moments is I didn’t sell my soul for the sake of popularity.

When you are content to be simply yourself and don’t compare or compete, everybody will respect you.

I pay attention to lyrics and I know what rap fans care about. I try to write for the average listener and I’m conscious of the mainstream without selling out.

Old is authentic. Old is genuine. Old is valuable.

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.

Everybody always laughs because I feel so much more comfortable with, like, a giant paper bag on my whole body and paint on my face. Sometimes I try really hard to take it all off. But inevitably what’s underneath is still not a straight edge. And I don’t think it ever will be.

When you have nothing important or interesting to say, don’t let anyone persuade you to say it.

People often think I’m a faker, but I’m usually honest, in a certain way – in such a way that often nobody believes me!

I hate the giving of the hand unless the whole man accompanies it.

I feel like in my music I can be a rebel. I can say things I wouldn’t say in real life.