I have as many pictures of my vocal cords as I do of my children. I have a great ear, nose and throat doctor, and we look at them - if there's some redness, maybe I'll take a little time off.

You leave home to seek your fortune and, when you get it, you go home and share it with your family.

Completeness? Happiness? These words don't come close to describing my emotions. There truly is nothing I can say to capture what motherhood means to me, particularly given my medical history.

I don't let people use me. That's why I like a small number of people in my life. The more people in my life, the more complex it becomes, so I just try to keep it at a minimum.

Time has nothing to do with the gifts that the gods give you; it's what you do.

I'm picking and choosing in terms of the stress factor. If it's not fun, I'm not going to do it.

I dont think being black has held me back at all. Being black makes you strong.

If I could be doing anything, I'd be laying on the floor in my birthday suit eating junk food and watching something dumb on TV.

If you have your own agenda and your own style and you don't easily conform to what the masses are doing, you're looked upon as being difficult. Whereas, I think of it as just being an individual.

Long tresses down to the floor can be beautiful, but learn to love what you have.

Historically, in my generation, all of my heroes and heroines have had issues and problems. We all do.

I have met many sacred souls in reading.

Passion for compassion will give you happiness.

Perhaps we'll never know how far the path can go, how much a human being can truly achieve, until we realize that the ultimate reward is not a gold medal but the path itself.

...Use your finger to trace the scar upon my chest- I lied - it wasn't a knife wound, but a scrape from a nail sliding under a fence to see you...

I think in general, lines are a bad idea. Especially if they sound like lines. Everyone's immediate reaction is to just kind of cringe a little bit.

Great leaders never accept the world as it was and always work for the world as it should be

I grew up as a tomboy. I was always barefoot, running races with the guys on the block, climbing trees, and beating kids up.

I don't lead a writer's life. And I think that can be a source of suspicion and irritation to some people.

Nature has invented reproduction as a mechanism for life to move forward. As a life force that passes right through us and makes us a link in the evolution of life.

Because I'm a filmmaker at heart, I know a villain can't be too humanized and the audience can't empathize with him too much.