I can't help but be a different person now that I've had kids. That really does change your whole perspective on life for the better. I definitely feel like I've grown up. So, I guess in a way parts of me are going to be different, but in general I'm still the same girl from the Bronx who had big dreams.

It's important for all types of women to know that you don't have to fit a prototype of what one person thinks is beautiful in order to be beautiful or feel beautiful.... People think, Sexy, big breasts, curvy body, no cellulite. It's not that. Take the girl at the beach with the cellulite legs, wearing her bathing suit the way she likes it, walking with a certain air, comfortable with herself. That woman is sexy. Then you see the perfect girl who's really thin, tugging at her bathing suit, wondering how her hair looks. That's not sexy.

Honestly, I have s much respect for single moms or anybody who finds themselves a single mother, but to even choose to be single mother is just so courageous to me. It is such a hard job to raise a child and be everything to that child without a partner. It's just admirable and courageous and brave and every other valiant word I can think of. I don't know if I could do it on my own.

But the idea of taking things and mixing them together is what I do in my music. I take hip-hop, R&B, pop, dance, funk and soul and mix it all together to get my own sound.

I think the best partner you can have is someone who makes you want to be the best form of yourself.

All the old clichés about women need to be undone. Enough already. We're in the other position now. We are desirable older, we can date younger guys and it's not this big taboo. Men have been doing this for years.

You can't take life for granted.