If you have a dream, this is your chance. We don't always have to play it safe because people might think you're weird.

Music is my way to shine back and express positive vibrations for a common healing. It's similar to farming, or surfing, or yoga. Before world peace, we have to have inner peace and music helps us get there.

You can turn off the sun, but I'm still gonna shine

I try not to write songs. I would rather emote them, and I found myself going back to my room every night while on my trip, just pouring out new songs and new stories about what I was seeing, what I was feeling.

Last weekend a young man asked me how I remain so positive. “It seems all the negativity in the world doesn’t affect you,” he said. I had no more than a minute with the young man so I offered this: It’s all about where you choose to put your attention, and I choose to be happy.

I aim to write songs in a way that you don't have to have gone to Ghana to relate to it, you really just have to have a heart.

I was looking for inspiration. I found it in California. The weather was always great, and the majority of San Diego seemed to be youth-and if you weren't 21 and couldn't get into the clubs, you'd go to a coffeehouse and hang out.