I think that when you're making your way up in the music industry you have all these heroes and the reasons why they are your heroes. As soon as you get into the industry your guidelines change a little bit. For me, my heroes now are great people first and great artists second.

Everybody has that point in their life where you hit a crossroads and you've had a bunch of bad days and there's different ways you can deal with it and the way I dealt with it was I just turned completely to music.

I think I first realized I wanted to be in country music and be an artist when I was 10. And I started dragging my parents to festivals, and fairs, and karaoke contests, and I did that for about a year before I came to Nashville for the first time. I was 11 and I had this demo CD of me singing Dixie Chicks and Leanne Rimes songs.

I'm so lucky that I get to write my own music and write my own stories, so every single time I look down in the audience and I see somebody singing the words back to me, it makes it all worth it.

I never want to end up being a self-centered, vain human being.

I think I have to trust that you end up with the person you're supposed to end up with, and that everything in between is there to teach you stuff.

I think everyone should approach relationships from the perspective of playing it straight and giving someone the benefit of the doubt. Until he establishes that this is a game. And if it's a game, you need to win. The best thing to do is just walk away from the table.