When I hear music, I fear no danger. I am invulnerable. I see no foe. I am related to the earliest times, and to the latest.

I’ve had two cancer bouts in my years on the Court, and the first one, Justice O’Connor told me, ‚Now, you do the chemotherapy on Friday because you’ll get over it during the weekend and you can be back in court on Monday.‘

I can operate in half-a-song format.

The way to know life is to love many things.

The influence of ‚Hidden Fortress‘ comes up a lot because it was printed in a book once. The truth is, the only thing I was inspired by was the fact that it’s told from the point of view of two peasants, who get mixed up with a samurai and princess and a lot of very high-level people.

When you look at the sun during your walking meditation, the mindfulness of the body helps you to see that the sun is in you; without the sun there is no life at all and suddenly you get in touch with the sun in a different way.

Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things.

Desire is the starting point of all achievement, not a hope, not a wish, but a keen pulsating desire which transcends everything.

With music, you often don’t have to translate it. It just affects you, and you don’t know why.

This thing that I do with caring about the message in my music, it’s not separate from my work as a commercial artist; they’re totally one and the same. I’m always going to be thinking about what my voice means.

Wit is the sudden marriage of ideas which, before their union, were not perceived to have any relation.

I was very camera shy. People like hot girls, so I put my music to hot girls and it just became a trend. The whole ‚enigmatic artist‘ thing, I just ran with it. No one could find pictures of me.

Fill the earth with your songs of gratitude.

Astronomy compels the soul to look upwards and leads us from this world to another.

When a person is going through hell, and she encounters someone who went through hellish hell and survived, then she can say, ‚Mine is not so bad as all that. She came through, and so can I.‘

One of my most popular songs, ‚Satellites,‘ I paid $300 for that beat on SoundClick.

When I start to write, I don’t have any plan at all. I just wait for the story to come.

The basis of our partnership strategy and our partnership approach: We build the social technology. They provide the music.

In the 1960s, people were trying to get away from the pop song format. Tracks were getting longer, or much, much shorter.

Better the rudest work that tells a story or records a fact, than the richest without meaning.

Every production of genius must be the production of enthusiasm.

In high school I wanted to be a rock star and was in a lot of bands.

There is no rule on how to write. Sometimes it comes easily and perfectly; sometimes it’s like drilling rock and then blasting it out with charges.

I hate talking about music, to tell you the truth.

‚The Lion‘ all began with a picture of a faun carrying an umbrella and parcels in a snowy wood. This picture had been in my mind since I was about sixteen. Then one day, when I was about forty, I said to myself, ‚Let’s try to make a story about it.‘

When my record comes on, you know that’s a DJ Khaled record. That’s my formula, and the people love it.

Great things are done by a series of small things brought together.

I only live in my music, and I have scarcely begun one thing when I start on another. As I am now working, I am often engaged on three or four things at the same time.

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.

No pessimist ever discovered the secret of the stars, or sailed to an uncharted land, or opened a new doorway for the human spirit.

God has equipped you to handle difficult things. In fact, He has already planted the seeds of discipline and self-control inside you. You just have to water those seeds with His Word to make them grow!

I’ve always felt music is the only way to give an instantaneous moment the feel of slow motion. To romanticise it and glorify it and give it a soundtrack and a rhythm.

When a man becomes a writer, I think he takes on a sacred obligation to produce beauty and enlightenment and comfort at top speed.

I don’t really believe in the type of pressure that people are wanting to put on the type of music that I make.

I don’t know what can be so dangerous about giving people hope. Causing people to have better relationships. I’m not leading them to some false God or something like that.

The doors of wisdom are never shut.

I got a greater purpose. God put something in my heart to get across, and that’s what I’m going to focus on, using my voice as an instrument and doing what needs to be done.

I think ‚Hail to the Chief‘ has a nice ring to it.

At 57, to have a No. 1 album, I wasn’t expecting it.

My songs are like my children – I expect them to support me when I’m old.

You have to do your own growing no matter how tall your grandfather was.

We are separated from God on two sides; the Fall separates us from Him, the Tree of Life separates Him from us.

I love being a part of the country-music community.

A lot of people from my generation of music are so focused on playing things correctly or to perfection that they’re stuck in that safe place.

A lot of my heartbreak songs are inspired by things my sisters are going through, or friends.

He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life.

We sometimes encounter people, even perfect strangers, who begin to interest us at first sight, somehow suddenly, all at once, before a word has been spoken.

If passion drives you, let reason hold the reins.

Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the thinks you can think up if only you try!

I was arrested for lip-syncing karaoke.

I don’t know how the rap game is, because I’m a fan of reality, and the rap game’s entertainment.

You listen to Charlie Parker or John Coltrane before they found their voice, they sounded different. And when you listen to them after they found their voice on their instruments, they sound more confident and in control. Artists have that, too.

It’s kind of fun to do the impossible.

I think music is one of the hero/sheroes of the African-American existence.

Letters are something from you. It’s a different kind of intention than writing an e-mail.

I have to write because if I don’t get something down then after a while I feel it’s going to bang the side of my head off.

Music was an experience, intimately married to your life. You could pay to hear music, but after you did, it was over, gone – a memory.

I really like Lady GaGa and everything she is for her fans.

Some people focus more on sonics. Some people focus more on story. I focus on both sonics and story, but music sometimes, just music itself, can turn into more of a maths problem. I guess everything in life is a math problem, but it can be more about an empirical route to getting the symmetry that you want, and this vibe, sonically.

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 draw from the crowd a lot.