My daughter could do and be anything, without having to fight to get through the glass ceiling. Without having it be so extraordinary. If my daughter went to produce a soundtrack for a movie, there would be nothing extraordinary about a girl doing it. When I did it, it was highly unusual.

As a writer, you look for someplace to start. Once you have a beginning and you've written the first two sentences, nothing else will ever change it.

The line is very delicate and fine between being what one might call sane or insane, well or unwell.

When I was sixteen, I began to think outside the box of my small town. Not that the people in my small town are in a box - they're not! There's a brilliant college there, and I had brilliant teachers from that college. But in terms of a conservative upbringing, which I did have within my own family, I just began to question things and to think for myself.

You don't want to say somebody did a great job of acting. You want to say, "Where did he find that person? How did he get that factory worker to come out of the factory and be on camera?" You want to believe that person is real.

I always sing them as though they are autobiographical, even if they're not, and most of my songs do come from something about me.

I do use reality because I want my work to feel real, I want it to feel heartfelt. I don't want to make it up and have it sound corny or unrelatable.