~Before, my career came first. All I had to think about was myself. Now my children prevail. It doesn't mean my career is less important; I just have to position things differently.~

Children are easily influenced, and I always want to do things I can be proud to show my kids someday.

I don't know why 'happy' can't be a story.

Nashville is one of the greatest places for the best songwriters in the world. It's been fantastic to live there and to raise our family there. It's a great town.

I think beauty comes from within. If you're happy and look at life in the best way you can, even when there are problems, it can make you beautiful on the outside.

Nashville was totally different than I ever dreamed. I had only seen the music business on television and been to a couple of concerts. I had no clue.

I have this strength that comes from knowledge.

Country music is the people's music. It just speaks about real life and about truth and it tells things how they really are.

It's not complicated to embrace life. You just have to make the choice.

A little bit of stage fright, then I'm ready.

It's okay to take time for yourself. We give so much of ourselves to others and we need to be fueled both physically and mentally. If we are in balance, it helps us in all our interactions.

All of us - who might have probed space, or cured cancer, or built industries - were, instead, black victims of the white man's American social system.

Be assured that any hurt to your spirit will pass in time. It is the nature of Death to take, but the nature of Life to give.

I think it's fun running with dogs. They're always so fit and fast.

Nostalgia: How long's that been around?

Julian once wrote that coincidences are the scars of fate. There are no coincidences, Daniel. We are puppets of our subconscious desires.

Nancy Reagan actually took some movies that she didn't want to take because they were [with Ronald Reagan] really strapped for cash.

I never wanted to express my independence by dressing in a particularly masculine way or appear particularly boyish.

I also like poems that are haunted by a structure or a narrative, or poems that frisk flirtatiously at the boundary of sense.

Fashion brings out what you are inside. A lot of people think it's got to be blue jeans, a Black coat, three inch heels. But it doesn't have to be like that. I enjoy just going for it

The Past, the Future, O dear, is from you; you should regard both these as one.