My father who was there in the house, he wasn't at all a role model. And my mother, who was trying to protect me from him as best she could, she took me everywhere with her, which gave me a tremendous amount of sensitivity to the things women go through.

The road that I'm on is a path that I didn't choose. It chose me. I'm just trying to walk it, and to do the best that I can to honor and respect it.

I know that there are a lot of people out there with stories far worse than mine but you, too, can make it. To those of you who have, welcome to life. I celebrate you.

I'm very open to fresh talent, and I love the underdog, people who have been counted out, because they come in with a different type of hunger. I'm all for the underdog, so I'd like to talk to anybody who shows up with that sort of thirst.

Music is always around, and it helps to heighten any emotion.

We don't have to wait for people to green light our projects, we can create our own intersections.

The question that a lot of people ask me all the time is how did you make it? The truth be told, it was nothing but the grace of God.