In my life the most influential people are people who are sort of brought to me, as opposed to people I seek out.

When you're young and everything dramatic is exciting, you start to believe that hype that, in order to be an artist, you have to suffer. I've graduated from that school.

The honor to me has less to do with the award. To me that translates in the relationship that I have with the audience, and if my music is helpful to them, that's the award.

With the things that I love, I tried to put a couple seeds, a bunch of seeds in the ground and see what sprung up. Sometimes it was acting and sometimes it was music. But whatever it was I continued to plant.

Nobody's going to force me to do something against my will. What do I owe anybody that I should submit my will to them?

My mother gave me a piece of bread, which was love and encouragement. The correction was the meat, the substance. And then she would sandwich that, sandwich that with another piece of bread, which was love and encouragement. That was very important in shaping and molding our morality, our understanding of ourselves, making sure that we didn’t think we were better than or less than anyone, feeling no more worthy or no less worthy than anyone else.

Every time truth comes we hate it, because it's coming against our ego. Are you going to let the ego come between you and this person you love?