I felt about life and the way I felt about my children was so deep and profound. It was the first time I'd felt anything like that. I knew as an artist that it was going to make a huge difference in everything that I did.

I remember listening to an interview with Beyonce and she talked about how she and her husband, Jay-Z, have always made it a point to have the conversation about them be about their music, not about their business, not about their personal business.

Just making sure that they both felt equally loved is what was tough about the twins.

I could serve coffee using my rear as a ledge.

Once you have a lot of success, you become a target in many ways.

It was easy to blame other people for treating me in ways I didn't like, but now I was seeing that I was the one at fault. The only way you can be mistreated is by allowing yourself to be mistreated, and that was something I did over and over again. Somehow, I needed to find that glimmer of self-respect, buried deep inside, that would allow me to say: I am never going to let that happen to me again. I needed to learn how to stand up for myself in a different way, but I didn't know how.

I came from the Bronx and a certain background. I worked really hard. I kept my focus on the right things.