“I decided early on that I was going to put on my crown and rule my world by acting right and treating myself like a queen.”

I often find it’s just the confidence that makes you sexy, not what your body looks like. It’s how you feel about yourself that makes you sexy.

No one ever got ahead by going through the motions. You have to constantly be improving yourself. Make your life the masterpiece you want it to be.

instinct leads me to another flow.

Anyone who knows me knows that I’m way more of a joker than I am a serious person.

So often, you don’t get that opportunity. You only go over everything once and, the next thing you know, you’re on set.

I learned you really do have to make sure you enjoy life.

I enjoy just being me. I don’t need to be Queen Latifah, the brand, 24 hours a day.

To me, doing a gay pride show is one of the most fun things. My first show that paid more than $10,000 was in a gay club on New Year’s Eve in San Francisco.

Beauty is not just a white girl. It’s so many different flavors and shades.

Most people don’t have so much talent that they can become a success all their own. We all need people to help us and lift us up.

To me, I always felt like I was carrying a torch for women of any size to be themselves – it doesn’t matter whether you’re a size 2 or a 22, just be who you are.

Every woman is a queen, and we all have different things to offer.

Dreams become reality when we put our minds to it.

It’s not always easy to do the right thing. But, doing the right thing makes you strong, it builds character.

Be bold, be brave enough to be your true self.

I write pretty often. I have a home studio. Music is what I do for fun. I never get tired of it, so to take a break from [TV and movies], I would go make some music.

I am just a bunch of bad decisions glued together.

I have decided that I won’t take up assignments that don’t interest me.

From a very early age, I made my decisions based on careers that I admire. The one thing that all the actresses I love have in common is that they have diversity in their careers.

I always leave that for other people to decide, because some of the things I consider to be disasters are some people’s favorite movies. And that’s what I like so much, is that you never know. Something intrigues somebody and means nothing to somebody else.

When I was 11, I decided to start rapping, playing guitar, and writing songs. Everything really blossomed from there.

While awaiting sentencing, I decided to give stand-up comedy a shot. The judge had suggested I get my act together, and I took him seriously.

Nobody can do everything well, so learn how to delegate responsibility to other winners and then hold them accountable for their decisions.

Music will never go away, and I will never stop making music; it’s just what capacity or what arena you decide to do it.