“I guess now music is so saturated and so microwaved. It’s, like, 15 minutes in the microwave and boom, you’ve got something. Nobody’s putting passion or any thought behind it anymore.”

Music is all about leadership and there ain’t really a lot of leaders.

With rap, it’s a funny thing. You can say things, and people can take ’em the way they wanna take ’em.

Anybody that’s got a problem with me is probably envious or wants to be me, and that’s how I’ve always looked at it.

It wasn’t necessary to speak on the recession, you know what I mean, but I just though it made a lot of sense. I was like, “okay, cool,” I’m going to go with this approach for the name of the album [ The Recession].

Every time I’m out and somebody tells me they love what I do, that’s what I do it for. That’s like my vice. That’s like my high. When people understand that this is who I really am, and to be appreciated for your craft .

I’ma continue to make records, continue to make hits, continue to be what I am, legendary.

I never wanted to be a statistic. I never wanted to be that cat who tried and never made it.

Anybody that I ever dealt with knows that I’m a very focused individual, and when it comes to my work and what I do, you might have to play the back burner to that.

You seen my shows; I bring the ‘hood out.

A lot of things come with fame, whether it’s losing friends or losing family.

My fans are my family, because they understand me and I understand them.

Think you figured it out, but you don’t have a clue. Think you on top of the world, but the world on top of you.

People who work every day are kind of scared of things they don’t understand.

You’ve got to be happy with yourself. You can’t sell yourself if you’re out here and you ain’t good. Because you’re giving people messages, and if your message is wrong, then it’s like the blind leading the blind.

You gotta have life your way. If you ain’t losing your mind, you ain’t partying right.

The world is yours and everything in it, it’s out there- get on your grind and get it.

My mother was given to a typical question: “We have always done this. Why should we do anything else?” But my wife’s typical question was “We have always done this. Why don’t we do it another way or, better still, why not do something else?”

My style when I was younger was still unique to me. I didn’t necessarily dress by the trends, but I was always aware of what was trendy at the time and how I could apply it to my own sense of style.

Get rich by taking something common and making it uncommon.

Keep a note pad and pencil on your bedside table. Million-dollar ideas sometimes strike at 3 A.M.

I love jotting down ideas for my blog, so I doodle or take notes on all kinds of stuff that inspires me: the people I meet, boutiques I visit, a florist that just gave me a great idea for an interior-design project, things like that.

In order to be creative, you don’t have to be original.

Creativity is the ability to introduce order into the randomness of nature.

I wanted to define the vocabulary of a wedding both visually and intellectually. The book is about more than weddings or wedding dresses. It’s a metaphor for women’s lives, their creativity.