A diva is someone who is a perfectionist, who does her best in her craft.

I can't do some of the songs that younger girls like Mary J. Blige and Beyonce are doing. They have their own place and I have my own place.

I know how to put it on when it comes to interviews and performing because I have to. But I'm pretty laid back.

Tell Aretha I’ll be praying for herBecause she needs Jesus!I love her.

All I can tell you really is if you get to the point where someone is telling you that you are not great or not good enough, just follow your heart and don't let anybody crush your dream.

So if anybody wants to get me something, get me 60 crabs - one for each year. I don't want no diamonds, I don't want no shoes, I don't want no party. I want some crabs.

God doesn't do the work for you; he does the work through you. It's not enough to look up; you must also look within.

That's another lesson I've learned the hard way. All relationships will die if they aren't nurtured. Just as a flower will die if it's not watered. Because love is demonstration, not declaration.

I don't feel as though I have to prove anything to anybody.

So if diva means giving your best, then yes, I guess I am a diva.

I just sing the stuff that makes me smile, makes me feel like I didn't sell myself out.

Genius has less to do with the size of your mind than how open it is.

Mothers are fonder than fathers of their children because they are more certain they are their own.

Through my research, I found that vulnerability is the glue that holds relationships together. It's the magic sauce.

I'll admit that I do quite like drinks that come in coconut shells. So there's always that.

Blue is the smoke of wrar, white the bones of men.

If you tilt the whole country sideways, Los Angeles is the place where everything loose will fall.

The fragrances are really a dream about the possibilities of a life. Nonconformity, no judgement.

There is in the child a special kind of sensitivity which leads him to absorb everything about him, and it is this work of observing and absorbing that alone enables him to adapt himself to life

I've never tried to learn the art of acting. I have been in the business for years but I still can't tell what acting is or how it's done.

Workplace accidents with people who are sleep deprived or people who work shifts and they don't get the right amount of sleep during the day or at night.