I'm excited about turning 40. I've been an adult for a long time, but there is a difference between being an adult and being a grown-up. I'm someone's mummy now and I'm enjoying that. I feel as if I'm about to hit my peak.

Soul music is about longevity and reaching and touching people on a human level - and that's never going to get lost.

I'm a secret interior decorator. There's a mural on my dining room wall of the railroad tracks at 30th Street Station in Philadelphia. I love having my hometown with me out here in California.

Just because you have a nightmare doesn't mean you stop dreaming.

I could hear music playing in the background of works by certain authors, like Poe and Shakespeare. And I discovered Nikki Giovanni when I was in eighth grade. Her writing has a musical energy with pulse and rhythm, almost like jazz or hip-hop.

There are repercussions to everything, even advancement and success. And I think that the repercussions to my success was the loss of my marriage.

God is ever present. He's in every breath, in every step. He's here, always, always.