I planned my success. I knew it was going to happen.

I take the same approach in all genres of art, across the board. It's intuitive.

My paternal grandmother gave me the courage to investigate things and not take things at face value or judge people by what I first imagine them to be.

Society has a problem with female nudity when it is not . . . ”—Badu pauses to get her words together; she wants this point to be very clear—“. . . when it is not packaged for the consumption of male entertainment. Then it becomes confusing.

Anything that had to do with art I been doing all my life. It was a gift. It's nothing I work real hard at doing.

The girls just like to be in the shoes. They like to scuff up the floors and walk around in high-heeled shoes that are too big for them, all over the house.

It's almost like a lot of black people in America, a lot of young black men, are born with this cloud over their heads. It's their penitentiary cloud, this philosophy we all have, that it's harder for us.