I knew his life deserved a chance/But everybody told me to be smart/Look at your career they said/Lauren, baby use your head/But instead I chose to use my heart.

I was very active. I was always all over the place trying to do a million things, just into this activity. If you asked me when I was 14 what I wanted to be: "Activist, first, is my occupation. I am an activist."

I went to Jamaica for six months, and in Jamaica there was a lot of stillness.

I have hour spurts when I feel fine and I can walk normal and stuff, other hours, I'm wobbling. I feel like there's somebody behind me kicking my legs out from underneath me. The whole tumor symptom thing is crazy. It's unpredictable. It really messes with your life.

Tell me who I've got to be, to get some reciprocity

People need to understand that the Lauryn Hill they were exposed to in the beginning was all that was allowed in that arena at the time. I had to step away for the sake of the machine. I was being way too compromised. I felt uncomfortable having to smile in someone's face when I really didn't like them or know them well enough to like.

From the time that you are a child, you grow up repressing yourself.