Ever since I was a teenager, I was always kind of, like, checking myself. You know, like, "Come on man, don't get your head all swollen. Life and time itself will give you perspective on what you're doing." So, that's actually what's always been a reminder in my own head.

You should be a person inside the world with knowledge of your terrain. And if you lock yourself into the 2,000-by-3,000-square-mile, lower-48 box of the United States, you're going to be frustrated by its limitations. You gotta think outside the box.

A visit to the hood through a record, or through a video, or through a film, is a lot safer than actually visiting the people in real life. It became a business model. It became a revenue engine that, you know, you can get to the hood without ever going there.

I think hip hop should be a living word. And what I mean by the living word is like yo, you gotta have the words that provide life.

Most of my heroes don't appear on no stamps

I think a good thing that needs to change is that people should be at least fearless about expressin' themselves.

My thing is, the older you get you gotta stand up for what you believe in, and keep bashin' away.