My father worked on assembly lines in Detroit while I was growing up. Every day, I watched him do what he needed to do to support the family. But he told me, 'Life is short. Do what you want to do.'

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.

Thank God for the gift of life.

Without the voice of reason, every faith is its own c

Start by doing what’s necessary, then what’s possible, and suddenly you are doing the impossible.

I don't know whether you have any rights before you're born. All I know is that being born again doesn't entitle you to twice as many.

No matter what you wear... to me, you will always have diamonds on the soles of your shoes.

Maybe you just get so attached to the music of your youth that you think it's better than what's coming out now.

A person is either the effect of his environment or is able to have an effect upon his environment.

Godliness is sexy in a way that physical attraction can never be.

It was shepherds who were the first to recognize a king that the rest of the world refused to acknowledge.

The universal Church of the faithful is one outside of which none is saved.