“I’ve shaken hands with every radio station, from Honduras to Ryan Seacrest’s.”

You feel that there is an avalanche coming when you meet the right person.

It’s incredibly liberating to spend an hour talking to someone and not caring about what you sound like. It’s about understanding myself. Sometimes I’ll speak to my therapist for an hour a day. It’s become part of my routine.

Videos come definitely after the music has been created, but I have always felt, and especially today, that videos are vital in the album process. I think that we live in a very visual era, and if you make a mistake with a video, those images will accompany the song forever.

I was a real mummy’s girl – still am. And as for my father, well, I have an Oedipus complex I’m still working out. I love that man!

I never made it to the school choir because the music teacher didn’t like my voice.

Education is the only way forward in Latin America and developing countries in general.

I’d love to go to that World Cup – I’m not sure in what capacity, but I’ll definitely be there. I know that nobody wants to miss it, least of all me.

I now talk to different cultures, and I hope that I can bridge those gaps and differences between us. It’s an adventure, a dream…

Becoming a mom forced me to re-prioritize and make room for the things that are most important, while recognizing that there are things I can let go of, and the world won’t crumble around me.

I’m a multi-faceted woman and person, like all women are – there’s no black and white. We have shades of grey in the middle. And even many more colours that other people don’t see!

I admire Madonna because she always did whatever she felt like doing. She went through some controversial periods when people rejected her, but she kept on reinventing herself.

I came to understand that I’m never going to be the perfect mother, but I’m going to do the best I can. Same goes for everything in my life.

If it was up to me, I would just wear jeans and t-shirts, even to red carpets, but then no one would photograph me, so that would make me very sad. So you know, I’ve gotta keep up with the rest of the female population and sometimes try a little harder.

Relationships have to have a give and take if they’re going to work in the long term.

We’ve built six schools in Colombia and do work in South Africa and Haiti. We teach 5,000 students.

I feel a real sense of duty to use the voice and the platform I’ve been afforded by my fame to speak out for those whose voices don’t get a chance to be heard.

Some things may work, but they definitely won’t work every time. Some things may work at various times.

However fragmented the world, however intense the national rivalries, it is an inexorable fact that we become more interdependent every day.

Do you think the Voice would come to me? I would that every one could hear the Voice as I hear it.

In every battle there comes a time when both sides consider themselves beaten, then he who continues the attack wins.

I’m changing every day as far as this rap thing. I’m learning new things. I’m getting bigger by the day.

Every man gives his life for what he believes … one life is all we have to live and we live it according to what we believe.

Memory is a great artist. For every man and for every woman it makes the recollection of his or her life a work of art and an unfaithful record.

Lost Illusion is the undisclosed title of every novel.