“When my father passed away two or three years ago, I didnt listen to music for four days – thats a long time for me.”

I would invite all Latin people to do nothing for about two weeks so you can see who really, really is running the economy I am here to give voice to the invisible.

Your mind is a magnet. You don’t attract what you need or what you want; you attract who you are. And I love who I am!

There is no person that love cannot heal; there is no soul that love cannot save.

First of all, the music that people call Latin or Spanish is really African. So Black people need to get the credit for that.

There is nothing more contagious on this planet than enthusiasm.

The best part of touring, still, is touching people’s hearts and igniting my band and igniting the people into what you call a spiritual revelation is sound and emotion.

Everything is a battlefield. If you fight with anger, you are part of the problem. If you fight with joy, you’re part of the solution.

Most people are prisoners, thinking only about the future or living in the past. They are not in the present, and the present is where everything begins.

Some songs are just like tattoos for your brain… you hear them and they’re affixed to you.

One day there will be no borders, no boundaries, no flags and no countries and the only passport will be the heart.

If you carry joy in your heart, you can heal any moment.

Your wrinkles either show that you’re nasty, cranky, and senile, or that you’re always smiling.

You’re always cursing, you’re always praying and you’re always making love. It ain’t do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do.

I’m laughing because I know the secret of life. And the secret of life is that I have validated my existence. I know that I am worth more than my house, my bank account, or any physical thing.

I am here to give voice to the invisible.

I have wisdom. I feel love. I live in the present and I try to present a dimension that brings harmony and healing.

My father always told me that. Nobody knows anything, so don’t listen to anyone else.

Like my father, I believe that nonviolence is the antidote to what he called ‘the triple evils of racism, poverty and militarism.’ These three evils were consuming our hopes for community in 1964, and, fifty years later, we remain divided because of their festering effects.

Often, I am asked, ‘What was your father like?’ or, ‘What would he think?’ These are very difficult questions to answer, as I was so very young when I lost my father.

My dad is Irish. I spent my childhood going back and forth between Ireland and America.

My sensei was a British karate champion named Brian Fitkin. He was my mentor and because I had a hard relationship with my dad, he became a father figure to me.

In the end, I still have the same hope as my father – that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the last word.

I think people couldn’t really put me in [one race]. I wasn’t Mexican, I wasn’t white, I wasn’t black, I wasn’t Asian… I wasn’t anything, and I didn’t really fit into anybody’s group. My dad is Mexican, and my mom is French and Danish.

There was a certain moment. I was about 61 – two, three or four, and I got a script. And I sent it back to the producer saying – “I don’t wanna do it. The part’s too small.” And he sent it back to me, he said, “You shouldn’t read the lover. You should read the father.