“I want art to make me think. In order to do that, it may piss me off, or make me uncomfortable. That promotes awareness and change, or at least some discussion.”

The only problems I’ve ever had with being honest is telling people how I feel about them or saying how I feel about other people.

To experience the good you have to have seen the bad; plus it makes you appreciate blessings more. Tough times taught me to be a fighter.

I’ve always loved to prove people wrong. I want to be able to cross color lines, because in music, there really is no barrier.

Carey’s had tough times as well, so between the two of us, it’s perfect.

When I was in seventh grade my mom caught me smoking cigarettes and punished me by making me smoke the entire carton. All it did was piss me off because I was out of cigarettes.

My definition of stupid is wasting your opportunity to be yourself because I think everybody has a uniqueness and everybody’s good at something.

Sometimes it takes a tragedy to bring people together, Other times it just takes music.

But just because it burns doesn’t mean you’re gonna die. You’ve gotta get up and try, try, try.

My stage show is raw and unpredictable.

I’d love to have time to do my hair, honestly. I’d love to be Victoria Beckham just for one day – to look that good. But I can’t.

I’m cool. I don’t need to be skinny. I like to be strong.

When you have a dark side, nothing is ever as good as it seems.

Sexy doesn’t have to come with the price tag of being dumb.

I’m pretty confident and, at the same time, I’m pretty insecure. I’m like a walking conflict.

Women have fought so long and hard for our rights and equality, and now all our attention is put on being a size 0.

Cutting, and suicide, two very different symptoms of the same problem, are gaining on us. I personally don’t know a single person who doesn’t know at least two of these victims personally.

I’m a sworn enemy of convention. I despise the conventional in anything, even the arts.

I really can’t speak on others, but in a sense, I feel like every artist always has their problems with the industry because we all want to have our creative way.

I consider myself an artist, which is, like, the most played term, but I believe it.

I feel like Houston is one of the leading things in music culture. Everyone loves the Houston culture. It needs to have its own monument, its own moment for artists like me, artists like Beyonce who set it off.

I see hip-hop as going in a self-managing place. It’s very culturally controlled and artist-controlled. It’s not really based on a label anymore. Everything is pretty much in the control of the artist. Which is amazing.

It’s not art for art’s sake, it’s art for my sake.

I’ve done jiujitsu a huge chunk of my life, and I try to spend a lot of time educating people on the nuances, the subtleness of the ground game. It’s a big part of mixed martial arts.

Martial arts are a vehicle for developing your human potential.