Music and art and culture is escapism, and escapism sometimes is healthy for people to get away from reality. The problem is when they stay there.

I don't believe that everybody is out of some kind of cookie cutter, so the thing that protects me is always being level with myself, even to myself.

Black folks are judged by quantity, not quality. It's a decimal point or figure. How different is that from slavery? There's no moral code, it's just about successful business for America.

Getting on the road and driving along a road at night, or even in the daytime and seeing the oceans or whatever, is always liberating.

Find like-minded people and try not to be individualized to the point where you try to fight it all and think about it all on your own.

The best medicine for pain sometimes is some kind of logic and common sense from older folks. They tell you, "Okay, you're not the only one who actually went through this."

Being called Black in America is the struggle to keep us moving and breathing over bloody water. Being a Nig**r or [Ni**a] without the context of history is like drowning in bloody water, dragging down those yet knowing to swim.