I think after doing Push and Shove and having it not be successful, I lost a lot of confidence. Songwriting, for me, has always been traumatic, and I've always made all these excuses. But I've realized that you have to just accept that it was a gift: "I don't know where it came from, I don't know how I did it, but I did write all those songs, and I gotta do it again."

I would love to learn to play something so I don't have to rely on someone to collaborate with.

Now I got my foot - through the door - and I ain't goin' no where.

When you write a great song, it just blows you away. When you write a song that connects with people around the world - I mean like it actually transcends language barriers - you see how it can affect people, and it's quite a tall order to follow up on.

You can't plan anything, right? You can try.

My parents always pushed creativity on us, but they made it seem like the fun thing to do.

Working with (new collaborators) and letting people in to try new melodies and new lyrical ideas was very hard.