When you walk in your home you don't have to maintain the same attitude that you had out in the street. You can be different with your people and your family than you are with a person that you run into in the hood. Even them they have to know to respond to you differently in the hood cuz if people see something out of the character that they portray you. They'll try you.

I think I'll be going to Heaven, because I had good intentions. But my actions are another thing.

In my neighborhood... they view the police as someone who comes to take their loved ones away.

I'm not trying to save the world. As a musician and artist, it just ain't me.

When you work for others, you are at their mercy. They own your work; they own you. Your creative spirit is squashed. What keeps you in such positions is a fear of having to sink or swim on your own. Instead you should have a greater fear of what will happen to you if you remain dependent on others for power. Your goal in every maneuver in life must be ownership, working the corner for yourself. When it is yours, it is yours to lose - you are more motivated, more creative, more alive. The ultimate power in life is to be completely self-reliant, completely yourself.

Sleep is for those people who are broke. I don't sleep. I've got an opportunity to make a dream become a reality.

I have received 16 Grammy nominations and I have no trophies, because I chose to write the harsh realities. I stayed true to myself and I've taken a little beating behind it.